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Chapter 509: The Bilingual Banner and the Evil God’s Equations
🕑 Added 2025-06-17 15:09:01 +0000 UTCCharlot Mecklenburg did not appear, but a new route was discovered. This left Juno Arthur slightly worried about his student. Of course, he wouldn’t rashly set foot on the new route but patiently waited for several days.
One day, as Juno woke from his meditation, he sensed the aura of Yishemierlen. This Evil God descended from the sky and handed him a letter. Charlot, fearing the Evil God might convey the message incorrectly, dared not let Him speak it aloud. Instead, Charlot had detailed his experiences in writing.
After reading the letter, Juno was left momentarily dumbfounded. Chuckling, he handed over all the ghost ships to Yishemierlen. Once Yishemierlen set out with the ghost fleet, Juno Arthur, rather than continuing to wait for Charlot’s return, excitedly commanded the Radiant Holy Kingdom and Emilia ships to enter the new route.
Charlot had chosen the port of Lazaro Cardenas out of necessity. He had already sent Yishemierlen to gather the ghost fleet, but the entire region of Mosuli lacked a suitable harbor, and even ghost ships required a port to dock. The Black Cologne region had two major ports, and Lazaro Cardenas was the closest to Mosuli.
Charlot led seven to eight hundred people in a march to the walls of Lazaro Cardenas Port. There, he ordered his labyrinth guards to raise a large flag. The flag was crudely made, consisting of several thin tree trunks tied together, with a white cloth hanging from it. To ensure it could be clearly seen by those in the city, Charlot had the top and bottom edges of the cloth secured.
On the flag, the following was written in both Farsian and Ingrima languages:
“Surrender and live; resist and the city will be slaughtered!”
In the New Continent, the primary currencies were the gold pounds, shillings, and pence of the Ingrima Empire, as well as the écus, flors, and centimes of the Fars Empire. Linguistically, the Ingrima language had an even broader reach than its currency. Over 60% of the population in the New Continent understood Ingrima.
The flag’s two sentences were concise and unambiguous. Its bilingual nature ensured that 90% of Lazaro Cardenas’s residents could comprehend its message.
The sight of this flag caused widespread panic among the port city’s residents. Some even refused to obey the orders of General Douma, who governed the city, and declined to climb the walls to resist.
The New Continent was teeming with immigrants, and its primary enemies were Evil Gods rather than humans. Its societal structure was vastly different from that of the Old Continent. In times of danger, cities and towns were unable to assist each other. After all, against the onslaught of an Evil God, no matter how many humans gathered, it would be akin to sending them to their deaths. Such a living environment made the establishment of nations nearly impossible. Apart from the overseas territories of a few Old Continent empires, most settlements were autonomous city-states or city-state alliances.
Facing an overwhelming enemy, cities in the New Continent were more inclined to surrender than to fight to the death. They valued their families, loved ones, and lives more than anything.
General Douma, though not a seasoned military strategist, had some basic common sense. Even though Lazaro Cardenas rarely saw war due to its position in the trade-rich Black Cologne region spanning two seas, he could see that Charlot’s seven to eight hundred men, poorly equipped as they were, stood no chance of breaching the heavily fortified port city. Yet despite his attempts to mobilize the populace, the flag reading “Surrender and live; resist and the city will be slaughtered!” terrified the city’s residents. War resistance was widespread. To many residents, it made no difference whether Douma ruled or those outsiders took over.
With no other choice, General Douma convened an emergency city meeting. In most New Continent cities, the highest governing body was the city meeting, unlike the Old Continent where royal families often held ultimate authority.
Charlot, meanwhile, grew bored as his labyrinth guards raised the flag and shouted loudly.
He hadn’t expected that a mere flag could compel the enemy to surrender. Such a battle was unprecedented since Charlot’s transmigration.
For an enemy to surrender at the mere sight of a flag required the commanding general to exude an air of sovereign majesty. Charlot lacked such qualities.
He pondered, “Should I feign an attack to see how Lazaro Cardenas’s residents react? But with only seven to eight hundred combat-ready men, what if a feigned attack results in heavy losses?”
“While extraordinary strength determines victory, ordinary soldiers also play a crucial role. Their lives can’t be squandered...”
Thinking of how the population of Mosuli had dwindled because of the struggle between the eighteen Evil God candidates, Charlot felt heartache. Those lives hadn’t been lost in vain.
Just as Charlot was considering retreating to find another way to attack Lazaro Cardenas Port, he suddenly saw the city gates open. A contingent of people marched out leisurely, carrying a white flag.
Though both sides bore white flags, their meanings were entirely different.
Charlot was stunned for a moment before ordering his troops forward. When General Douma met Charlot, he said, “Lazaro Cardenas Port seeks peace. We are willing to surrender, but please promise not to harm any residents.”
Charlot agreed wholeheartedly. He first ordered Douma and all city council members who came out to surrender to be tied up, then led his forces into the port city.
He hadn’t anticipated that with his army at the city’s gates, Lazaro Cardenas would surrender without a fight.
Even as Charlot struggled to believe how easily he had taken the city, he showed no hesitation. Upon entering, he immediately disbanded the city’s defensive forces and governing council.
When the city’s residents protested, Charlot announced that dissolving these institutions would eliminate taxes. This quickly turned the tide in his favor, gaining him widespread support.
A seasoned politician by now, Charlot seized the opportunity to abolish old laws, enact new ones, establish a commerce alliance, and rebuild the West Wind Knight Order, forming a force of over a thousand men.
This military venture left Charlot emboldened. Leading his newly formed West Wind Knight Order, he launched a relentless campaign, swiftly conquering nearby cities.
Meanwhile, Yishemierlen, leading the ghost fleet, had left the Aggras Sea and begun crossing the Golden Sea. The waters between the Aggras Sea and the New Continent were called the Golden Sea, which also gave the New Continent’s western coastline the name Golden Coastline. This was due to adventurers who, upon reaching the New Continent, quickly discovered a gold mine near one of the coastal cities. Thus, the Golden Sea and Golden Coastline earned their names.
The Evil God drifted daily in the skies, guiding the ghost fleet while muttering incessantly: addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, quadratic functions, trigonometric cosines, subsets...
His mind was flooded with mathematical knowledge. Whenever he tried to relax, an exam paper would automatically materialize in his thoughts. Unless he completed it, his head buzzed incessantly, granting him no peace.
This was entirely Charlot’s fault. His occupational habit as a mathematics teacher had caused him to bestow several hundred sets of math exam papers upon the Evil God. Normally, these would occupy only a small corner of someone’s memory. However, Yishemierlen’s memory loss was so severe that his primary recollections consisted almost entirely of these papers...
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