Alice in the Land of Steam

Chapter 918 Is this Alice’s enlightenment?

Xino left, leaving Lingge alone in the cemetery.

Although the old patriarch requested that the funeral be as simple as possible before his death, thus eliminating many complicated rituals, proper mourning is still essential. The knights of the Gustaf family are setting up a mourning hall in the manor house, lighting long, dim candles, placing the old patriarch's portrait and bunches of pure white snowthorn bouquets, expressing their deep sorrow for the old patriarch in this way.

Tomorrow, Xino will release this news to the outside world and invite grandfather's former friends, including the residents of the small town of Regram, to come to mourn. It is also possible that some people will come spontaneously after hearing the news and pay silent tribute to the old patriarch's tomb, although for most of these people, the only intersection with the old patriarch in this life is that they have heard of this name.

Social interaction is often like this, and although the Gostave family is not powerful, its reputation in Grindelwald is deeply rooted. Almost everyone who wants to make great achievements in this land will consider the opinions of the Whitethorn Emblem before carrying out their great deeds. In the past, the Gostave family, with its small population, was willing to keep a low profile, so they could not find a suitable excuse to contact them. Now they will not miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

The old patriarch's wish for a simple funeral seemed to be shattered by the ambitions and desires of these people. It can be imagined that Xino will be very busy in the next period of time, which just gave Lingge and others enough time to think about a question: Since they want to rely on the power of the Victory Kingship, do they have the courage to bear the curse?
At least, Lingge can't give an answer at this moment.

The candles left by the old butler Weber were still burning in the empty and desolate cemetery, emitting heat and light. The young man knelt down slowly on one knee in front of the newly erected tombstone, and stroked the soft bouquet of white thorns with his fingers. He closed his eyes and once again offered his condolences. However, after listening to the story told by Shino, this faint sadness was filled with a little more admiration.

Before this, the only person he respected was his adoptive father, Mr. Yang Ke.

Perhaps these two are essentially the same, both are the kind of people who are willing to sacrifice themselves for others.

After a minute of silence, the young man opened his eyes again, stood up and left the cemetery. His back gradually disappeared at the end of the dim candlelight, leaving only the cypress leaves all over the mountains, spreading the lonely echo in the wind.

……

Because of what happened, it was inconvenient for Lingge and his guests to stay at the Shadoli Manor, so they had to return to Yunjingkong Island at night. Along the way, Alice kept pestering the young man, asking him what he and Xinuo talked about privately, and whether it was related to the main task? But Lingge did not answer at all, only saying that he would gather everyone to discuss it after returning to Yunjingkong Island.

Alice didn't understand what was there to discuss, and she thought that the "everyone" Lingge was talking about were just the young royal families, but she didn't expect that he would even call the three sisters from the Fairy Deep Sleep Inn, Sister Livia from the Heavenly Heart Church, Countess Nevi's daughter and guardian of Leticia, and Little Sun, the representative of the Herb Garden.

Even Yieta, who lived in the windmill tower and was unable to leave, participated in the Sky Island people's meeting in an alternative and novel way - Lorena placed a purple conch in her place, and Miss Angel had another conch in her hand. These two alchemical props, which Alice forced to name "magic conch", had the effect of long-distance communication, allowing Yieta to communicate with the outside world at any time no matter where she is. It can be said that apart from the telescope, these are the rare little inventions of the Sea Princess that have practical significance.

"The principle is actually very simple." Rorona explained her practical little props to everyone: "The symbiotic shell beasts are a race that has incredible induction abilities between twin entities. It is said that this is their racial talent. Therefore, props made from their shells will naturally have similar effects. However, this sea beast is a rare species and is rarely seen. I only have this pair of shells I brought from the Nereids. Even if you want me to refine another one, I can't do anything about it."

She spread her hands, seemingly speaking to everyone, but actually her eyes were looking at Alice. Everyone who understood what she meant understood.

Only Alice understood but pretended not to understand, thinking to herself: How can I let Yieta have such a useful little prop all to myself? I have to find a chance for Mao to come and play with it!
Yieta, who was having a great time communicating with Saint Shalia using the magic conch, never expected that she would be targeted by a thief the moment she got her new toy. Linger saw through Alice's plan at a glance, but he was too lazy to expose her or remind Yieta, mainly because he felt that although these small props were convenient, they would gradually make Yieta lose interest in leaving the windmill tower room.

If you stay in the windmill tower house, you can enjoy a normal life without leaving the house. Someone will take care of your food and drink every day. When you are bored, you can use a telescope to see the scenery, or chat with friends with a magic conch. When you feel lonely, you can find someone to play with you. With such a comfortable and easy life, wouldn't the angel lady who goes with the flow be addicted to it and completely lose the heart that occasionally strives to make progress?

So why not let the golden-haired maid teach her a profound lesson. If it can stimulate Miss Angel and make her determined to step out of her comfort zone, it will be a great achievement - as for how she will withstand Yieta's anger afterwards, it is none of Ling's business.

It's scary when an honest person gets angry.

A group of people filled the first floor lobby of the Fairy Sleep Inn. Before the proprietress could take the opportunity to propose a banquet, Linger directly spoke out the core topic of this meeting, which was the question that Xino left before leaving. He simply recounted his conversation with Xino in the cemetery, hiding the girl's past experiences and emphasizing her curse, and then asked for everyone's opinions.

After listening to this, everyone looked thoughtful.

"The curse of sacrifice." Rorona pushed the frame of her glasses. The transparent lenses reflected the lights in the hall, giving people a deep and wise feeling. "No wonder the old man was determined to die at that time. In this situation, no matter how good the medicine is, it will be useless."

"Humans are such an interesting race." Countess Nevill took a sip of her tea, a meaningful smile on her lips. "In their history, there has never been a lack of heroes who sacrificed themselves for the greater good. Every time I thought how despicable they were, someone would make me realize how noble they were. This reminds me of the founding war of Metosh. In the war between aliens, humans were just insignificant dust, and it was difficult for them to even struggle to survive, but many people still stood up and fought to protect the weak. Some aliens thought they were stupid, but Neo thought they were all admirable warriors who were qualified to share the glory of victory with him. If Mr. Vanindru had lived in an era when tribes were constantly fighting, maybe he would also be a great hero admired by others?"

She raised her chin in an elegant arc, drank the tea in one gulp, put down the cup and said to Lingge, "Please tell Miss Xino that the Silver-Eyed Countess from the Peninsula deeply regrets the death of Mr. Van Indreu and is willing to express condolences on behalf of the Valenhild family at his funeral - if she doesn't mind that I am a vampire."

Given the attitude of the Gustaf family towards aliens, it is unlikely. It is said that there were vampires living in the Forest of Loser in the past, but those vampires could not stand the rules of the Whitethorn Flower and left here on their own initiative.

Linger nodded gently: "I'll tell her." The Countess withdrew her gaze with satisfaction, and then motioned Mr. Rabbit next to her to refill her empty cup with steaming hot black tea, and seemed to have no intention of continuing to express her opinion. Obviously, this was her attitude - it didn't matter.

The longer she lived in the world, the fewer things she cared about. On this Cloud Whale Island, she only cared about her granddaughter. If it weren't for the aggressive Witch Society, the Countess might have taken Leticia to live in seclusion in some corner of the peninsula after killing all the aliens in the Virtual Root Swamp.

But no one else could be as casual as her, especially those who were also young queens.

They were amazed by Xino's royal power, but the curse of sacrifice made these young girls who were not well-versed in the world feel a little scared.

"Victory Kingship..." Olvera murmured, her eyes a little absent-minded, and she didn't know what she remembered: "As long as we are willing to fight, we will definitely win. Isn't this exactly what we lack the most? With Xino here, we don't have to be afraid of the Witch Society at all, right?"

This is true.

Many people nodded in agreement: All along, what they lacked most was fighting power. Even though they had Alice's magical game console and cartridges, Lorena's logistical support, Countess Neveria as the backbone, Ieta as the final insurance, and the three fairy sisters who were travelers and mastered fairy magic and could work wonders at certain times... Generally speaking, as long as they were not crazy and wanted to dominate the world, they should have no problem walking sideways on the Sigiriya continent.

But who made their enemies more powerful?

A huge cult that controls more than 70 percent of the political, economic, cultural and military resources of the Western Continent, a witch society composed of apostles and philosophers selected from countless human elites, eight witches who guide the tentacles of the witch society to secretly erode the trajectory of history, and constructed mechas that are beyond human imagination and difficult to resist by manpower... Compared with this lineup, the Sky Island lineup seems to be nothing.

In Alice's words: "They are the galactic battleship, and we are just a small broken ship."

The golden-haired maid frowned and put on a serious attitude for once: "To be honest, if I don't use some cheat codes or something like that, I really don't know how to fight the Witch Society."

And isn’t Shino’s kingship the most powerful cheat code?

These are not small cheats like locking head, locking health, aiming, unlimited props, unlimited money, etc., but battle winning cheats. You did all these messy things before, aren't they all for gaining an advantage in the battle? But many coin minting novices were killed even after using cheats, which shows how powerful Xino's kingship is.

Alice was even wondering, if Xino was put on the battlefield alone to fight against the eight witches of the Witch Society, an unknown number of constructed mechas and a million crusaders, would she be the winner?

Based on Shino's own description and her battle against the synthetic monster Chimera, it is not impossible.

Of course, the Witch Society couldn't be that stupid. They already had information about the "Lord Knight" and naturally couldn't put all their forces into one battlefield and be wiped out by Shino. No matter how strong the Lord Knight was, there was only one person and he could only lead one victory. If ten battles were fought at the same time, Shino would naturally win her battle, but lose the remaining nine battles. There would be no point, right?
This is the so-called gap between tactics and strategy. It is estimated that it was because of this reason that the Cult of the Goddess of Creation, which had the main knight as a combat force guarantee, lost to the Witch Society.

but!

If, if the Witch Society gave the Creation Goddess Church a little more breathing time, maybe the ending would be very different. Xino's kingship not only represents victory, but also represents hope and infinite possibilities. Under the aura of invincibility, how fanatical will the believers who follow the Lord Knight become? How many believers can the growing Creation Goddess Church absorb? And how many forces that were originally hostile to the Witch Society but suffered from insufficient strength are willing to join their camp to conspire for the great cause? For example, the Thirteen Hermits Society founded by Solomon, so far, seems to have been losing in the confrontation with the Witch Society. If they were given Xino, would they not want it?

If you want to blame someone, just blame GI for designing such a character that disrupts the balance when developing the game.

Are the official plug-ins not considered plug-ins?
Alice said: It’s none of your business!
As long as Xinuo joins their camp, then the Cloud Whale Sky Island, which was once seriously lacking in hard power, will instantly gain the combat power to compete head-on with the Witch Society. What a wonderful thing! Just thinking about it, Alice trembled with excitement - because she is a genius gamer, and it is well known that genius gamers like to cheat in games the most.

No matter if it's the bugs, evil ways of playing, wheelchair weapons and cheat codes in the game, or the intimidation, threats, bribery outside the game, or even secretly scaring the opponent when she's not paying attention and asking her to transform (Ovira & Ieta:...), as long as I can win the game, then, as a genius player, I am willing to abandon my conscience, dignity, moral principles, or everything else that can be discarded, including electronic dragons!

This is my Alice’s realization!

I would like to ask if you have such awareness.

　Give me some meow
　　
　
(End of this chapter)