With Wuying Qi's "persuasion", the neural networks that looked like black threads also invaded Li Yao's flames of spiritual energy and crawled into his body through his pores.
No matter how he boosted his flames of spiritual energy and waved his arms, he could not get rid of the things that were like maggots on his bones. Instead, he felt that Wuying Qi's words seemed to be echoing from the depths of his eardrums, stimulating him to think from a completely different perspective.
"You … are completely crazy!"
Li Yao tried his best to resist the black nerve bundles that invaded his brain. He managed to say, "You call the catastrophe that has caused the death of so many people and even the destruction of an entire Sector a 'treatment'?"
"That's exactly what treatment is. Is there a surgery that does not bleed at all? Is there a drug that does not have side effects at all? Or rather, when the patient is too ill to be cured, most of the body organs will have to be cut off and replaced with artificial limbs and artificial hearts. It can't be helped at all. "
Wuying Qi smiled and sounded even more sincere. Gentle brilliance was even beaming out of his body. If it weren't for the weird picture of the black water drops and the neural networks around him, he would've looked like a doctor who cared about the country. "You find it unacceptable only because of the gap in cognition. It's like an ancient person who lived tens of thousands of years ago. If he saw a modern doctor cutting open the patient's chest and abdomen with a scalpel, removing the diseased tissues, or even opening the skull with a bone saw for a craniotomy, he would've certainly been shocked and thought that the doctor was a fiend that devoured hearts and brains. However, the modern people who have grasped the basic medical knowledge naturally know that the doctor is treating and saving people. Even though there may be bleeding, injuries, and even certain death rates during the treatment, and there may be a lot of sequelae after the recovery, it's all acceptable.
"Don't rush to refute it. Please think about it calmly. Think about everything you've seen since you came to the Imperium. Think about how you agreed with Li Linghai's judgment on the four families. Admit it, Vulture Li Yao. The Imperium of True Human Beings today is at the end of the dynasty. It's already rotten, and it has been plagued by both internal and external problems. Minor improvements are absolutely hopeless. If we don't adopt thunderous approaches, the Imperium will fall apart in the blink of an eye, and the billions of citizens will be blown to smithereens!
"The court is bloated and powerless. The warlords rise everywhere but attack each other. The powerful officials control the court but only consider their own interests. Even the four Kurfürst families are full of selfish and hilarious conflicts. The fair, open, and fair way to select the elites and the promotion channels for the bottom-level elites that I designed for the Imperium a thousand years ago, on the other hand, have all been blocked, corrupted, and riddled with holes. Even the surface can't be maintained properly!
"Such an enormous Imperium, which boasted the most prosperous planets, the most abundant resources, and the greatest number of talents in the entire universe, is falling apart because of those pests. Not only can it not defeat the Holy League, it can't do anything to the reformists, and it is barely capable of dealing with the merchants of the Business Alliance of Ten Thousand Sectors. It can't even kill a few insignificant Cultivators. What kind of Imperium is this exactly?
"Disgrace. This is the greatest disgrace for the Immortal Cultivators, the greatest disgrace for the Imperium, and even more so for me! When I returned to the Imperium and saw that the glorious Imperium that was established after all the difficulties a thousand years ago had been reduced to such a state by those unfilial descendants, I couldn't have hated it more. Even the entire universe could not have extinguished my fury!
"From that moment on, I swore to all the stars in the universe that I would do whatever it took to heal the Imperium, restore it to the vigor of the past, and make it truly qualified to represent the great civilization of mankind.
"As long as the responsibility and glory of every Immortal Cultivator can be awakened again, as long as the Imperium and the civilization of mankind can regain its glory, I'm willing to try any treatment!"
More and more black nerves crawled into Li Yao's pores and slithered below his skin like worms, making black air pop up all over his body and face.
The black air even attacked Li Yao's eyeballs and danced weirdly around his pupils.
Li Yao gradually lost the ability to argue. In a trance and hesitation, he listened to Wuying Qi's indoctrination.
"I've spent decades considering why the Imperium has degenerated into what it is today, who is the culprit, and where is the source of the problem?
"Should the four Kurfürst families be blamed? Of course, they are all shortsighted and greedy guys who do not deserve the title of real Immortal Cultivators at all. But that's just their appearance. Everybody is selfish. Selfishness is both the source of disasters and the greatest motivation for a civilization to move forward. It is the sharpest double-edged sword.
"The source of the problem is the vast sea of stars. The distance of almost a hundred lightyears between different Sectors, and the vastly different topography of different planets, is like a certain magnifier that magnifies the flaws of selfishness to the maximum!
"In the age of the ancient Cultivators, the rulers only occupied one planet, or at most a few planets close to the Sectors. However selfish and blind the people under their rule were, and however domineering the ministers were, it was very convenient for them to mobilize troops to suppress them and grasp all the people and resources tightly in their hands.
"However, in the age of the universal civilization forty thousand years later, because of the unchanged communication and transportation, it is very easy for barriers in trade, military, and even politics to be formed in the Sectors that are far apart from each other. The barriers will then morph into selfish interest groups that can't be completely removed as a cancer that slowly corrupts the whole.
"What is even worse is that in different Sectors, many habitable planets have vastly different terrains, which gives rise to different ethnic groups that have vastly different customs and even appearances. It is very difficult for those ethnic groups to have a sense of identity, shared historical memories, and honor with each other. They often only know that they have their own small worlds, but they do not know that the Imperium and His Majesty exist.
"Getting to the bottom of it, based on the brain capacity, communication methods, technological development, and history of human beings, we should not establish an enormous Imperium that includes three thousand Sectors at all but should be divided into hundreds of smaller countries, each of which governs one or a couple of Sectors at most. That would be the most natural state.
"We are a child civilization or a subcivilization that has been created in the first place, but our creators perished too early. We are like orphans whose parents have both passed away. We are forced to break into the cold world before we are fully grown. We imitate our primeval ancestors clumsily, trying to unify the entire universe like the Pangu Alliance of Civilizations, but we do not know, or do not realize, that we are not prepared to shoulder such a heavy burden at all!
"The Imperium was not destroyed by the four Kurfürst families but was crushed by its own weight and defeated by the vast universe!"
Fascinated, Li Yao mumbled, "Dongfang Wang, the former prime minister of the Imperium, said the same thing. He said that … our common enemy is the universe!"
"Yes. Dongfang Wang is a real wise man. I talked to him deeply about the issues in a very clandestine way before."
Wuying Qi said, "It's a pity that Dongfang Wang can see it, but he still can't see through it. As the helmsman of the Dongfang family, there are too many things that he cannot let go of for a hundred years. He can't make up his mind to treat his wounds like I can.
"Even if he does see through it, with the cruel and brutal nature of human beings, the hundreds of smaller countries will still fight each other incessantly after they are divided into hundreds of smaller countries. Blood will flow incessantly, just like the ancient Cultivators forty thousand years ago.
"Besides, you and I are both very clear that if we stay in this small, enclosed universe, we will only repeat the mistakes of the Pangu civilization and countless other primeval civilizations even if we develop to the maximum. We have to find a new path and be the first civilization to completely break out in the past billions of years!
"To be the first civilization to break out of its shell, it is necessary to build a unified imperium that includes all the resources, talents, and planets. That is the contradiction between 'big' and 'small', a contradiction that can barely be resolved.
"If I only want to eliminate the four Kurfürst families, it will actually be very easy. I have a hundred ways to completely destroy them, but it will only be a temporary solution. Today, the four Kurfürst families and even all the warlords may be destroyed, but as long as the communication and transportation methods of human beings do not improve significantly, as long as there are still astronomical populations under the Imperium's governance, and as long as those people are still selfish and greedy, it won't be long before a second 'four families' or even 'eight families' are born. They will be like an inexhaustible virus!
"Li Yao, is there also the problem of social stratification and interest groups in your country of Cultivators? Right, I estimate that your country is not very large. You have just defeated the Black Wind Fleet and received a bonus of development. So, you may not have a deep understanding of the problem.
"But think about it. One day, when your country of Cultivators expands to a hundred Sectors with trillions of people and tens of billions of Cultivators, how are you going to maintain the purity of the Cultivators? How are you going to ensure that the authority of the central government is acknowledged by the magnates at the border? How are you going to insist that your so-called education system and your promotion channels will not be twisted and corrupted by the interest groups?
"It's impossible, Li Yao. Let me tell you something. I've thought of and put into practice all the approaches, but none of them can stop the metamorphosis and corruption of a great country. Even if I don't destroy your country of Cultivators and allow you to develop and thrive freely, you will be crushed by your own weight one day.
"The demon dynasty that ruled the sea of stars for thirty thousand years was crushed by itself. The Star Ocean Imperium was crushed by itself. The Star Ocean Republic was crushed by itself. Right now, the Imperium of True Human Beings is repeating the same mistake and is about to be crushed by itself. Can your country of Cultivators jump out of the cycle of the rise and fall of the dynasties and not be crushed by the universe and itself?"
A weird smile popped up on Wuying Qi's face.
But what scared Li Yao the most was not the smile, but that he had truly believed Wuying Qi's words without him knowing it!
Yes, the experts of the Federation all agreed that the most suitable size for the Federation was eight to ten Sectors. If more Sectors joined the Federation, all kinds of unexpected problems would be raised, and the Xing Yao Federation would be crushed in the end!
However, while the Federation could maintain the current size, could the Imperium?
If not, what could be done to keep the Imperium as it was and prevent the division of the Imperium so that most people could survive?
"To completely reverse the wretched fate and ensure the loyalty, selflessness, and unity of all the people while maintaining the unity of the Imperium, there is only one way."
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