Super Righteous Player
Chapter 1049 - 107 This Dennisiowa looks like it’s completely finished

Chapter 1049: Chapter 107 This Dennisiowa looks like it’s completely finished

"...Let’s not talk about that for now."

Annan rubbed his somewhat stiff cheeks, "How do you think he did it?"

"I think he’s deceiving people,"

Isaac stated bluntly, "Whether it’s the Flamell surname, that face of his, or the name—along with that messy technology, I believe it’s all fake.

"This has been over a hundred years since my death. Even my ancestors from a hundred years ago couldn’t possibly look exactly like me. After all, our family doesn’t practice inbreeding. Even if the elf blood lineage could have a profound impact, this is completely absurd.

"And ’Drest’ means ’to extinguish its light.’ Isn’t that the very definition of faking or aging things!

"Transferring thermal energy is even more impossible. If he stored thermal energy in some kind of liquid, that might be plausible... but the loss rate would definitely be more than 12%. At this distance, having 50% would be fortunate.

"Because in the end, the difficulty of transferring thermal energy lies not in the transfer itself, but in maintaining low losses. The transfer itself causes loss, and if one wants to keep it around 10%, that means it almost doesn’t radiate any heat. It’s not impossible, but that would be at the level of a cursed object—just like ’ice containing light.’ The cost of creating a ’heat transfer cable’ of that scale with a ritual, god knows how much it would cost.

"He’s definitely deceiving someone. But I don’t know at which part he’s lying, or whether it’s all a scam from start to finish... His aim is to incite civil unrest. It’s not impossible."

"Indeed."

Annan nodded in agreement.

He also felt that the man’s purpose might indeed be to incite civil unrest—otherwise, why specifically thermal energy?

The two of them, one a legitimate foreigner and the other a ’living fossil’ who hadn’t appeared in public for over a century. They didn’t understand the current Dennisiowa.

To prevent them from getting into trouble, Ou turned thoughtfully briefed them on the recent situation in Dennisiowa.

These were all public intelligence, nothing secretive.

—Only upon hearing did they realize that it was truly terrifying.

With fewer merchant ships and pirates establishing fixed territories, difficult to penetrate due to the presence of cannons and rifles... The main source of income for pirates had actually become so-called "management fees."

Such as protection money collected from inherently stationary businesses like pubs, restaurants, inns; or from gambling dens, and once-off and repeated sales of "human resources" earned from these gambling dens...

And these didn’t actually make much money.

After all, those who could afford such services were still the same group of people.

Previously, the Winter Duchy had closed its ports—a move that significantly impacted the confederated kingdom.

Even though Winter and the confederated kingdom were far apart, in this world, maritime trade nearly could not function on oceanic routes because food would spoil easily amidst the Mist.

Ordinary caravans couldn’t possibly outfit their ships with steam engines.

They had to follow the ocean currents... choosing a counterclockwise direction, starting from Dennisiowa, circling around the huge whirlpool, passing through The Holy Nation, Winter, Noah, Feld Archipelago and then returning. Buying a round of goods and selling them at the next destination.

And when Winter isolated itself, the confederated kingdom immediately followed suit.

—Because the trade around the huge whirlpool was what the confederated kingdom needed most. They resided on land that had been bombarded into smithereens, severely lacking resources like food, meat, textiles, wood, stone, and heavily dependent on luxury exports and imports of essentials.

They could be said to have nothing.

Except for ships, sailors, wizards, and luxury goods.

Now with Winter shutting itself off, merchant teams departing from Dennisiowa could only go to ports south of The Holy Nation, and then immediately loop back southward; to reach Noah, they had to wait for the trade teams from Feld to sail to the southern part of Noah, trade, and then head back directly.

The economic situation gradually became less optimistic.

And in such a relatively isolated area, there were only so many suckers to scam.

As the scammable gamblers went bankrupt one by one... these pirate gangs realized something.

It was somewhat acceptable that Dennisiowa was wealthier. But in places like the Feld Archipelago, where most people had never left their birth islands for their whole lives—a decrepit place. Even the "new girls" they obtained had no one interested in them, so they could only sell them in Dennisiowa.

And Dennisiowa’s flesh trade started booming for this reason...

Now everyone was poor, but they couldn’t just dismiss their crew. There weren’t any enemies, but they still had to keep them fed.

But seizing new territories... Everyone had cannons, and considering taking someone else’s land wasn’t realistic—people were on land, and they were at sea. The consequences of being hit by a cannonball were different.

Thus, as the income from these "management fees" started dwindling over recent years.

The confederated kingdom’s pirates—especially those from the Feld Archipelago, where over eighty percent of their income was due to excessively marked-up essentials.

Black fire, green fire, salt, smoke, and alcohol.

These commodities, compared to rice and oils, were more expensive, easier to store, and wouldn’t starve people to death, yet they were still essential goods with genuine demand. They were often maliciously marked up three to four times for sale.

Three to four times was considered "relatively lenient."

The poorer the area, the higher the price the pirates demanded, and the more goods they intercepted.

At first, it was direct robbery.

Once they had made money, they started buying goods directly from Dennisiowa to avoid attracting a fatal disaster by robbing too much.

Just before docking, these goods would be overpriced by twenty to thirty percent, swallowed up by these "pirate merchants." The merchants naturally knew something was off—but as long as they got their money and could return safely,

they didn’t care.

Then these pirates would turn around and sell these goods to the islanders for three to four times the price.

When Blackbird spoke of this, he was both angry and helpless.

He said that they couldn’t control it anyway.

Bronze-tier Transcendents were completely unable to resist the barrage of cannons and firearms.

He saw it very clearly—the pirates weren’t afraid of one or two Transcendents. Not some mounted police or detectives, but the nobles behind them.

Annan guessed it was because of this humble attitude... that made the nobles think they could still tighten the dog’s collar a little more. To prevent the dog from eating too much and getting too fat unintentionally.

But the problem now was that even the dogs were starving mad.

Their "tightening of the collar" would likely be met with backlashes from the neurotically tense pirates.

Their fear of the nobility was predicated on the assumption that all pirates would just watch the show.

But once these pirates unite...

They were entrenched in every port, equipped with multiple cannons and more than ten warships.

If they truly united... and with some "governors" in the Feld Archipelago who had long disliked Dennisiowa covertly supporting them.

Dennisiowa seemed doomed.

"This move by Earl Flamell is definitely meant to provoke a war."

Annan whispered low, "But don’t you think... that his technique could actually be accomplished?"

"...What do you mean?"

"I’ve even thought of at least three ways."

Annan said seriously, "The first is through enchantment."

Hearing this, Isaac’s expression became serious, "Indeed. If he truly used enchantment... both the Elves’ bloodline, that name, surname, and what he did, it all makes sense.

"What about the other two?"

"The second is that he stole the Power of the Chariot—Charioteer is also about transport. Considering that there are nobles in Winter digging up the graves of Charioteers, I think this too is possible.

"As for the third..."

Annan narrowed his eyes slightly.

His intuition as a Ritualist initially confirmed that it was impossible.

But then he really thought of a method.

—Just liken the "heat cable" in the ritual to a "blood vessel." Then heat can be confused with "vitality," transporting from the "heart" of Dennisiowa to the limbs.

However, the heart pumps blood to the limbs. Naturally, blood will return from the limbs as well.

This was something Isaac wouldn’t think of—a unique déjà vu that Annan had. When he saw the "homunculus," he thought of "nation forging."

Yes.

Annan was considering if this person...

might be one of Nicholas’s leftover homunculi from the past?