Seized by the System

At the western part of the Concrete Jungle in the Land of Heritage.

There were education specialists in every classroom, giving lectures to groups of people that varied in complexion and age.

Tens of billions of newborn babies were placed in the building’s best floors, where they received attentive care from the caretaker mechs.

Some of these mechs were real ones that were reincarnated from souls, while some of them were mechs that could be controlled spiritually.

Multiple versions of them had been revamped and overhauled. Although they did not differ much from normal human beings in appearance-wise, they did not share the same biological traits as humans, such as metabolism.

In contrast, they were much more productive than normal humans for they lacked physical limitations.

Of course, some people had been trying to achieve breakthroughs in the study of actual artificial intelligence. In this respect, the rise in productivity would be limitless.

However, the cores of the current mechs were ultimately controlled by human consciousness. This still gave them a threshold of fatigue.

Continuously working for two hours would put humans in a state of frustration and boredom. They needed to rest to restore their physical energy.

Nonetheless, it was already the Era of Mystery and relying upon scientific technology to achieve breakthroughs in artificial intelligence might be too slow. With that, many maverick cultivators had attempted to find new ways to make AI a reality.

The present advantage was that the global unemployment rate was very high and there was no need to worry about the labor shortage.

Currently, most people depended on cultivating magical energy on a daily basis to obtain basic material needs for survival. Other material needs, however, were harder to satisfy.

Only a handful of experts who were highly skilled at controlling spiritually-controlled mechs were qualified to go to the outside world — or Earth — to work on matters such as reclaiming barren lands, planting herbs, mining minerals, and managing businesses.

There were only 3% of such qualified laborers.

Now, with the addition of the important tasks of caretakers, much of the remaining labor force had been used up.

Taking care of children was supposed to be a natural ability that was innate in most people. Yet since most people were not trained in parenting, as a result, it had produced numerous scums for society.

Though this time around, each and every caretaker had undergone strict training. The children they were going to take care of were prized beings and they might become powerhouses one day.

If something went wrong during the nurturing phase, the outcome would be devastating.

Under such immense pressure, it could be said that it was the first time a policy where “parents need to acquire a license” had been introduced to the history of mankind.

“Remember, a child’s education doesn’t revolve around how smart and talented he’ll be, nor how many achievements he will bring to the table. Instead, we must instill the three core values into his mind, which are kindness, love, and righteousness. As long as these three values are met, the threshold of the children would not be broken even if a problem arises during the process of nurturing,” a specialist said firmly.

These three points were the core concepts of the Alliance of Justice and Order and they were soon accepted by the Cultivators Assembly too.

It was because no one wanted to produce a powerful yet selfish and oppressive genius.

On the contrary, a group of kind-hearted regular folks would be far better than a mighty villain.

At least, for the time being, they still had ways to gather the powers of a large number of regular folks to resist the enemies via the Magical Energy Bank, the Spiritual Nets Above Snares Below and the Celestial Dragon Form.

If they created a villain on their own instead, the end of humanity would be imminent.

Sturdy fortresses were often destroyed by internal forces — it was an unshakable historical truth. Whether or not it was the Ming Dynasty of China or the once glorious Russia, they were not defeated by external foes but fell due to internal conflicts.

If they went wrong with their educational direction, there would undoubtedly be a powerful villain amongst the tens of billions of prized children.

The Black Dog Brett was crouched on a floor, staring at those human-form mechs who were taking care of the babies.

It was commanded by Fang Ning to closely monitor everything that happened in the Land of Heritage, especially those members of the Dualist Society.

It was also the first one to discover the group of migrants earlier.

Now, however, it envied the job of the caretakers. It lifted two legs from time to time to imitate the actions of the caretakers.

“Sigh, when will I have puppies of my own?” it said to the Red Fox beside it.

“Erm, Brother Brett, you possess a metal body now. You can never have puppies. It’s better you let it go…” The Red Fox tried to talk some sense into it.

“…” The Black Dog felt dejected.

“A few days ago, I heard that Brother Yellow’s wife is pregnant and I’m not sure how many months it’ll take for it to give birth. Brother Brett, you have a good relationship with Brother Yellow. Perhaps you can adopt a few puppies from it,” the Red Fox suggested.

“What the heck?! It’s fine if I’m no better than it, but to help it raise its puppies is absurd!” the Black Dog snapped angrily.

“You said that yourself, so why throw a fit?” The Red Fox was tired of giving it attention and so, it focused on the actions of the caretakers.

“I’m sorry, I was wrong.” The Black Dog immediately lowered its head and apologized.

Meanwhile, the Red Fox was recording the activities of the caretakers.

” At the beginning, the man is good. Similar in nature, different in behavior… ¹ ” A caretaker was reading a passage to a baby.

The baby seemed to understand what was being said. It blinked its large, watery eyes and moved along with the caretaker.

“Hey, these babies look like they develop rather quickly. How many days have passed since their birth? Don’t you tell me that all of them are like Ne Zha ¹ ?” The Red Fox’s eyes were wide with surprise.

“Is this for real?” When it came to the important issue, the Black Dog steadied itself and observed carefully.

Just as what its partner said, the baby seemed to understand the caretaker’s words, and it was not alone. The rest of the babies could understand the words as well.

To humans, it was a shocking sight.

However, to the Black Dog, it had no feeling towards this surprise as it was a common sight back in the Upper Realm. There were not only babies who could understand what was spoken a few days after their birth, but also babies who could talk while still in the womb…

Nevertheless, it did what it was told and reported this matter to his master, Fang Ning.

When Fang Ning saw this, he suddenly realized that instead of the fifteen years which he had expected, the babies could cultivate after three or four years and become qualified producers of magical energy.

Ultimately, based on the common knowledge of cultivation, cultivating while one was still young was the right way to go. Cultivating as an adult would be too late.

What did this mean? The woes of an era or the evolution of humanity?

No, this should be the scheme of the Upper Realm.

These children were born from the River of Blood. Undoubtedly, the fact that they were blessed with superior intelligence was related to the Upper Realm.

While Fang Ning was still having his epiphany, Ren Ruofeng sent someone to request for a meeting.

An assortment of gifts piled up before the Dragon’s Cave on the hill.

Sir System’s prediction was right. Back in the day, when Oldman Ren needed anything from him, he would either send a message or come over empty-handed.

Now, when Fang Ning had transformed completely into a dragon, whoever wanted to meet with him had to pave the way with tons of gifts…

The person who came over this time was a serious-looking middle-aged man.

With a respectful tone, he spoke, “Venerable One, after the Bronze cauldron had been sealed, there was a period of stability for a month or so. However, something occurred today. It took us much effort before we managed to stabilize it. Unfortunately, this has resulted in some injuries and deaths which is very saddening.”

The green dragon laid in the Dragon’s Cave without opening its eyes.

Listening to this in the System Space, Fang Ning felt surprised.

“Huh, did this really happen?” He stood up and paced the floor. “No, I must go have a look.”

So, he used the fire dragon’s body double and followed the man to the Land of Heritage.

After looking at the seal, he sought the opinions of the two gods.

At last, he understood that this was the true ploy of the Three Masked Men.

Naturally, humans would not be willing to pay a magical energy tax to the intangible World of Spirits and Souls. Since the beginning of modern civilization, it was universally understood that the paying of taxes should come with the provision of public services.

As for the Spirit Lords, they relied on fear and threats to make the humans pay taxes without getting anything in return. How was this acceptable?

Obviously, this sort of procedure would receive countless protests.

Neither passive nor active protests would be particularly effective. This was proven by all kinds of anti-tax protests recorded in history.

Worst case scenario, a non-violent form of protest could be done. How was it possible to tax the people when everyone refused to cultivate?

Still, the Three Metal-masked Men were very familiar with the current circumstances of humans. So, they created a large cauldron as a tool to acquire taxes.

To prevent the curse from spreading, humans had to work together and put in the effort to seal the cauldron using magical energy.

Little did they know that the cauldron could absorb magical energy on its own. With this, humans proactively paid taxes while the other party did not have to spend anything to acquire taxes.

“Ingenious…” Fang Ning had to give them credit. “So many devious tricks in the Mysterious World. Humans are still millions of years behind these fellows.”

“Don’t just sigh in admiration over there, you sound like a traitor. You better think of a solution. That’s my money in the future.” Sir System pressured him.

“What can I do? I’m at wit’s end, too. Perhaps you can remove it?” Fang Ning inquired.

“It’s not impossible to remove it, but look at my System Space. It’s only a hundred over meters high, whereas that large cauldron is more than a thousand meters tall, and let’s not talk about its volume. I have no idea how many experience points I have to spend in order to extend the System Space and make space for it,” Sir System replied helplessly.

“Indeed, the root of the problem lies in the fact that we didn’t reload enough money.” Fang Ning felt disappointed.

“Yes. Let’s make those fellows wait patiently first and we shall talk about this again after a few years.” Sir System made a decision.

“Looks like it’s the only thing we can do.”