Chapter 162: Analysis of the Northern Kingdom

"Seven kingdoms built along the river..."

"Formal citizens generally live prosperous lives and possess a strong sense of national identity..."

"Informal citizens, restricted outside the city walls through various means, exhibit a low sense of national identity..."

"Cities are divided into intra-wall and extra-wall districts, with the two classes holding completely polarized evaluations of the nation..."

"The seven nations comprise approximately 5,000 formal citizens and over 8,000 informal citizens..."

"Within the intra-wall district, every individual owns a vast expanse of land, capable of engaging in various productive activities to achieve self-sufficiency while supplying others; the extra-wall district is densely populated with limited territory, making it impossible to sustain many survival activities..."

As he perused the intelligence gathered by the field army soldiers from every perspective of the Seven Northern Kingdoms, Mo Fangyuan felt increasingly that something was amiss.

According to Iron Nose's description, the primary material needs of the residents inside the walls were met mostly through their own survival efforts, and occasionally they even supplied provisions to the residents living outside the walls...

This was exceedingly bizarre. There was no economic exploitation, yet military oppression existed...

"The intra-wall district generally feels sympathy for the residents of the extra-wall district; the extra-wall district generally harbors hostility toward the residents of the intra-wall district..."

Forgive Mo Fangyuan for his limited perspective, but he genuinely could not fathom the point of the Seven Northern Kingdoms acting this way.

Recreation?

If it were truly for amusement, they surely wouldn't provide protection and food for those restricted non-citizens living in dead villages.

Boredom?

As the concentration of people increases, mob-spawning efficiency rises. Once population density reaches a certain threshold, the spawn rate skyrockets. No matter how bored one might be, no one would play with their own life...

Against the historical backdrop where Cube-people are generally united, possess clear subjective consciousness, and instinctively protect other Cube-people... engaging in class divisions and segregation was undoubtedly digging one's own grave, arousing the hostility of the vast majority of Cube-people compatriots toward those nations...

And yet, there were actually seven such kingdoms, all connected to one another.

"Mob spawning?"

Recalling what Iron Nose had mentioned earlier: the northern nations possessed a special wonder that could suppress monster spawn rates, providing a guarantee for the survival of the Northern Kingdoms.

Iron Nose had also stated: From the analysis of various intelligence reports, the primary function of that wonder is indeed to suppress monster spawning, yet after staying there for over a month, I never saw a single monster appear, nor did I ever encounter the existence of any monster drops...

The people living inside the walls were also insensitive to monsters; when I described the terror of monsters to them, their expressions were as if they were listening to a fairy tale... Strange?

On the contrary, the emotions of those living outside the walls showed some fluctuations...

Clearly, it completely halts monster spawning, yet they claim it merely suppresses monster spawning, and this state seems to have persisted for a long time. This is rather thought-provoking.

"The wonder is a large plaza capable of suppressing monster spawning, and this large plaza exists in every single kingdom of the Seven Nations..."

The acquired intelligence indicated that every one of those seven northern kingdoms possessed a wonder-architecture known as the large plaza.

These wonders, which occupied extremely vast areas, were uniformly distributed at the center of the cities in the Seven Nations.

Logically speaking, wonder-architectures should be unique, with a single wonder appearing only once, yet here seven of them appeared simultaneously, and within the exact same region.

"Suppressing monster spawning, causing monsters not to spawn, restricting compatriots to a specific zone outside the city walls..."

Mo Fangyuan's intuition told him there must be a connection here that he was unaware of, only that his mind was not flexible enough to discover it.

A headache-inducing task, Mo Fangyuan decided to shelve this matter for later handling. Anyway, these were foreign affairs, and dealing with them or not would have no impact on the Cube Kingdom.

Setting the large plaza and its related documents aside, Mo Fangyuan began browsing through other intelligence concerning the Seven Northern Kingdoms.

"The strongest northern kingdom—Water River Kingdom, with a total population of around 1,000 to 1,200, possessing special weaponry..."

"The second strongest kingdom—Leafwood Kingdom, with a population of around 1,000 to 1,100, no special weaponry, but possessing a special food source: Golden Carrots..."

"The third strongest kingdom—Valiant Kingdom, with a population of..."

"The fourth strongest..."

As he flipped through the intelligence reports and gazed at the synthetic map of the Seven Northern Kingdoms, Mo Fangyuan's thoughts soared.

That gigantic city in the storyline had been divided into seven Cube-people kingdoms; did the protagonist's kingdom still exist?

If it had existed, and the protagonist was still alive, and the plot continued to progress in its original direction, in what posture should the Cube Kingdom participate in the plot... resisting the invasion of the Piglin Empire and plundering the legacy of the Piglin Empire?

These were all matters that Mo Fangyuan, as the navigator, needed to pay attention to.

"The attitude of the Seven Northern Kingdoms toward non-citizens is uniform: restricting activities, delineating boundaries of movement, and suppressing them by force..."

"Every nation is absorbing vassal villages, bringing the total number to at least thirty. These villages will continuously transport population to the outskirts of the walls of the Seven Kingdoms, swelling the strength of the non-citizen demographic..."

Mo Fangyuan merely glanced at the data files documenting the population issues inside and outside the walls and temporarily laid them aside.

"The city is thriving and prosperous, yet its defensive facilities are unusually primitive, the number of warriors is small, military training is poor, and it is suspected of not having encountered a crisis for a very long time..."

"The Seven Nations help and support one another, maintaining long-term trade relations and profound friendship, with mutually open borders. The people of the various nations within the walls are unseparated from one another, capable of normal communication and trade..."

"They frequently hold various nationwide entertainment events, often lasting ten days to half a month, consuming time and effort..."

Born in calamity, dying in peace.

The situation described by Iron Nose coincided precisely with the combat effectiveness of those armies that were effortlessly thrashed by the Piglin Empire in the movies.

Only in such an environment could an army of utter weaklings be bred.

"Southern mountains and deserts, northern plains, western plains, and the east is still plains."

It seemed the terrain in the north was not much different from the south; both were vast plains.

Developed transportation, prosperous trade, living in comfort, low combat effectiveness, a massive population market, friendliness toward compatriots and friendly nations, a promising future...

While analyzing and evaluating, and pondering the value within, a bold plan took shape in Mo Fangyuan's mind.

Those northern kingdoms possessed abundant supplies and population, but lacked powerful weapons and equipment to defend those supplies, as well as state institutions capable of orderly management of a massive population.

The latter was less obvious, but the former would be perceptible to anyone who wasn't a foolish ruler.

Because strength is the prerequisite for defending dignity, a lesson paid for in blood and tears by the ancestors of the Cube-people.

And the Cube Kingdom, to put it mildly, possessed weapons and equipment that were definitely stronger and more advanced than those nations enjoying peace and comfort in the north.

Therefore, Mo Fangyuan could trade with them, selling strategic weapons and materials at high prices while purchasing raw materials at low prices...

Going a step further, he could also introduce a more advanced currency exchange system to the backward northern nations, integrating that massive market into the currency sphere...

Well, this felt very Eagle-like.