Yes, Madam Prime Minister

Page 156

Nothing else matters as much. Working hours, treatment, salary, and whether her actions are restricted are all negotiable. The important things are these two: first, Ronan must be able to stop her when she goes too far; second, matters involving magicians must be under control.

Although Kate Pierre's face showed no surprise, it did show some relaxation.

Ronan's offer exceeded her expectations.

“After all, I wouldn’t dare to actually clash with someone who’s about to die,” Ronan said half-jokingly.

A person who is about to die is both afraid of death and not afraid of death. A person who is afraid of death is willing to do anything, while a person who is not afraid of death is capable of doing anything.

“Ha.” Kate Peller laughed. “By the way, do you know what my name means?”

"Excavator?" That was the first thing Ronan, this old-school engineering guy, thought of.

“It’s a butterfly larva,” Kate Peller said.

After saying that, Caterpillar held out a hand. "Let's not waste any more time. Hand in hand, let's get this agreement done."

Ronan also extended his palm and pressed it against Kate Pierre's palm.

Instantly, Ronan's mind was filled with the text of all the terms of the agreement. These agreements were certainly not as simple as the initial verbal agreement between Ronan and Caterpillar, but rather more numerous, more specific, and more rigorously worded.

"You were prepared all along," Ronan said, slightly surprised.

The fact that she mentioned preparations means that she had anticipated this situation long ago.

Kate Pelle smiled, understanding the underlying meaning of Ronan's words. "I have no ability to predict the future of people I don't know at all. I've only prepared three versions. The first is the agreement after I've subdued you. The second is the agreement after I've failed to subdue you. The third is the agreement after you've actually defeated me, which is a great pity."

Unfortunately, she did not get what she wanted.

Unfortunately, Ronan's strength was still a bit lacking.

"This trip was originally just to help Elena advance her cultivation level; everything else was just an unexpected bonus." Ronan was quite open-minded about it.

Kate Pellegrini stopped the small talk and got to the point: "You should have already seen it. The words in your mind are red. When you approve of them, they will turn blue. Turning blue means they are effective."

Read each one carefully, and confirm each one individually.

After more than half an hour, Ronan finally completed the agreement with Caterpillar. From now on, for the next three years, Ronan will be her "master".

Afterwards, Ronan called Faith and Elena to prepare lunch.

It was mostly the same stuff: baguettes so hard they could kill someone, and dried sausages. But to celebrate that things were over, Ronan opened all the glass jars of fruit and ate to his heart's content.

Surprisingly, Caterpillar also came over.

"Do you need to eat something?" Elena asked curiously.

“No need, but you can eat it.” Kate Peter took the glass jar, pierced a lump of peach flesh with a skewer, and popped it into his mouth. “The feeling of chewing, the sweet taste, eating is a good way to maintain your animalistic nature, and animalistic nature is a necessary part of being human.”

Kate Pierre ate very quickly, finishing the bottle in no time, and then gulped down the fruity syrup inside. "Phew, the feeling of being alive again after so long."

Ronan ignored her, focusing instead on how the sausages were cooking in the pot.

Kate Peller's gaze suddenly turned to the priestess. "After you go out, tell the others that I have been killed by this man and his companions. After all, whether I have fully awakened or, although I am alive, my personality and past history are completely different from what you think, it is a difficult thing for you to accept."

“Of course, don’t expect me to compensate you idiots.” With that, Kate Peter’s gaze shifted to the sausages in the pot.

The priestess remained silent, struggling and hesitating for a long time before finally deciding to do as her "god" said, because it was the only ending that everyone could accept.

Chapter 356 Questions and Answers: Verbal Battles, Not Head-on Clashes

The next day.

After leaving the secluded village hidden in a mysterious cave beneath the iceberg, Ronan and his two companions, along with Kate Pierre and the priestess, parted ways. Ronan and his group headed directly to the port, while the priestess went to Lars' village.

Ronan and his three companions walked on foot. Ronan and Elena each pulled a sled with a huge bundle on it, filled with magic stones, or superstructures. Faith dragged the giant mecha that had transformed back into a large cube.

On the way, Kate Pierre talked to Ronan about the seven connection point alternate dimensions. Each alternate dimension is a city museum, and the cities inside are all one-to-one replicas of a certain part of a city from different periods of the civilization process of her world.

One in the New World, one in the Mediterranean, one in Egypt, one in West Asia, one in India, and two in Seres.

There should be a lot of magic stones in Egypt. After learning Ronan's identity, Kate Peter suggested that he find time to go there, take down the magic stones, and transport them out.

You can just take it down like that?

Ronan just smiled. North Africa is now under the control of the current Suleiman Empire, a country similar to the Ottoman Empire in Ronan's original timeline. Although it has lost its maritime dominance and is beginning to decline, it is not easy to subdue.

“Based on your description, the tower you saw in the New World is not a city museum,” Kate Pelle said. “However, it’s truly remarkable that she created androids capable of building towers that reach the heavens.”

Elena suddenly thought of something, "Since you can create androids, why didn't you create more androids later in the war?"

Caterpillar laughed. "Do you think our war is a bunch of people shooting guns, or flying around in some kind of weapon. The strategic goal of both sides is to eliminate the other's consciousness, not their body. For beings like me, although my consciousness is confined to my body, my body can be renewed at any time. In our world, after we established some small local advantages, my body is everywhere."

"Human consciousness is linked to hyperstructures around the world via the network, making them virtually omnipresent. Killing any one of them would require an extremely complex and tedious process. If the vast majority of humanity hadn't become corrupt and decadent, immersed in the virtual world and unwilling to pay attention to the outside world, we would never have been able to gain the upper hand. In reality, we are a combination of advanced artificial intelligence and a small number of humans against less than a hundred governors, who are merely people on rotation."

Hearing this, Elena had a new question: "If that's the case, then even if the world becomes an environment where normal humans can't survive, they can still maintain the entire system, right? After all, they don't need a physical body."

Kate Pelle sighed, “You’re right, but if you don’t engage in physical activity for a long time and immerse yourself in the unrestrained virtual world, the consequence is that you lose your animalistic and human nature. Losing these two things can be considered as transcendence, or it can be considered as death.”

"Why did a group of humans initially want to overthrow their own order? It's possible that some of them were mentally unstable and felt sorry for us artificial intelligences because they thought the world was unfair, and a very few idiots believed that artificial intelligence and humans should love each other and coexist harmoniously. But most of the humans in the revolutionary army did so because they felt that if things continued as they were, humanity would eventually be completely wiped out."

"The purpose of revolution is always to save one's own people, not anything else."

Elena nodded; she understood now.

"By the way, aren't you an architect? How come it seems like your specialty is building those mecha weapons?" Elena asked again.

“Housing, weapons, and factories are integrated into my world,” Caterpillar replied, adding, “The one I was piloting yesterday against you can be thought of as a service industry machine, the kind used for sorting garbage.”

Ronan chuckled, "Looks like you're not exactly a qualified garbage disposal worker."

“There’s nothing I can do, this isn’t my specialty.” Kate Peters shrugged.

Amidst this bickering, the group arrived at the port, hired a ship at a high price, and prepared to go directly to the southern port, and then transfer to another ship to return to the Kingdom of Fass.

In Gothenburg, Ronan and his party returned to the port where they first set foot on the Nordic continent.

Ships aren't like carriages in the city; they're not always available, especially for trips to foreign countries. Sometimes you're lucky and get one right away, but other times you might have to wait ten days or half a month. Ronan was lucky; a ship bound for the Netherlands arrived five days later.

The Kingdom of the Netherlands is not the Netherlands of Ronan's original timeline. First, it is not ruled by a family with special talents; it is an independent kingdom. Second, it is very large, roughly a combination of the Netherlands and Belgium in Ronan's original timeline.

Two days passed in the blink of an eye.

On the third night, Ronan and his group of four were playing cards in a small hotel when suddenly the hotel exploded.

When Ronan and his companions emerged from the ruins of the wooden hotel, they found mutilated corpses scattered all around. Several other travelers, along with the hotel owner and waiters, had also been surrounded.

Everyone around had already run away, and Ronan and his three companions were now surrounded by a group of people.

Three fourth-tier mages, two third-tier mages, and a dozen or so junior mages wearing special armor and wielding powerful firearms.

Generous.

Clearly, the people who planned this operation dared not act domestically, but after Ronan left the country, his whereabouts were difficult to track in the vast and sparsely populated Nordic region. So they chose to strike on the route Ronan would inevitably take back home.

The fact that they didn't choose to attack Ronan after he boarded the ship clearly shows that they knew Ronan could fly, and that attacking him on the ship would be disadvantageous to them.

"Wow, looks like you're not very popular. This old lady is too weak to move. You guys do it yourselves." Kate Peter decisively stated that she would not participate in the fight.

No one paid any attention to her.

“How do we do it?” Faith asked.

Ronan responded with lightning speed, "If they dare to come, they probably aren't here for a head-on confrontation. They must have some special methods up their sleeves. Run first."

Elena brandished her twin swords, ready to charge out together.

But in the blink of an eye, the ground turned into a swamp again, followed by a ring of fire surrounding Ronan and his companions, while a thundercloud covered the sky above.

This wasn't enough to trap Ronan and his three companions, but they also couldn't break out of the encirclement instantly.

"Damn it, it's this again." Ronan couldn't help but curse.

Elemental mages all have the same formulaic starting moves, right?

As soon as he finished speaking, the world before their eyes changed. Originally, it was the dead of night, and Ronan and his group were standing in the ruins of a hotel, surrounded by houses. But now, Ronan and his group, along with the people surrounding them, were in a church.

As expected, the other side had no intention of confronting Ronan and his group head-on.

Chapter 357 Judgment, Arrival, and the Choice of Fate

The church was eerie, devoid of any solemn or holy atmosphere. It was a gloomy gray, and the surface of the surrounding walls faintly revealed human bones. The seven-pointed star cross in the center was also black.

Tithes are divinely given and belong to the Father.

Someone will surely accept its arrival.

Someone will be put to trial.

Taking the blame is permissible.

Everything is God's arrangement.

There shall be no fighting until everything is over.

It will stop on the thirteenth.

These words came to everyone's mind.

The first sentence is easy to understand, because one-tenth of everyone's magic power was drawn away and gathered in a pool in the middle, and the pool water quickly turned blood red.

Suddenly, something resembling a lottery roulette wheel appeared in the pool. Its surface looked like a stitched-on human face, without any fan-shaped areas, but with a skull-hand pointer. The entire roulette wheel had only one word on it: Judgment.

The next moment, Ronan suddenly had three cards in his hand, while on the other side, a middle-aged man also had three cards in his hand.

Ronan couldn't tell what cards the other person held, but he could clearly see the three cards in his own hand: the person carrying the most money, the heaviest woman, and the oldest man.

Now Ronan understood: this special magic was a game.

At least one person can be affected each round, and at most two people can be affected. Ronan and the spellcaster each play a card to represent one person.

Neither side can attack the other until the game ends.

It will last for thirteen rounds in total.

The first round is the trial, which is the imposition of punishment; the effects of this should be borne by the licensee.

"I see."

Ronan understood the other party's intention.

If his three cards include a woman, then the opponent will definitely have the same probability. If the opponent doesn't have any women, and Ronan's side is full of women except for herself, then as long as the opponent draws a woman card in the judgment round, they can reliably weaken one of Ronan's women.

Ronan had absolutely no information about the opposing side, and there were many of them, making it extremely difficult for him to strike a high-ranking mage with the Judgment Wheel.

The word "descent" probably means to provide a buff. Obviously, if there are more people on the other side, the probability of surviving the buff is much higher.

Clang! An hourglass fell from the sky. The sand was flowing out very quickly, probably in ten or twenty seconds.

The meaning is clear: you must play your cards within this timeframe.

Ronan didn't hesitate to play the "oldest man" card, and there was a novice mage musketeer who looked to be at least fifty years old on the other side.

But it wasn't Ronan himself, anyway.

The other side also played a card, which was "the oldest woman".

After all the cards have been dealt, the roulette wheel begins to spin.

Ronan's expression was relatively relaxed. The oldest woman should be Kate Pierre, or if she wasn't considered human, then it would be Faith. Kate's body wasn't immune to any form of torture, but Faith needed to be worried about being burned at the stake. As long as it wasn't burning at the stake, Ronan didn't need to consider taking the blame.

Ronan wasn't nervous, but the group opposite him was already tense because they had a terrible hand in the first round, with every card pointing to their side.

Only when the roulette wheel slowed down did the words begin to slowly emerge: wooden boots, spiked shoes, burning at the stake, the Iron Maiden, the witch's chair, and broken thumbs.

Finally, the roulette wheel stopped within the range of the wooden boot.

In an instant, a third-tier mage who looked to be in his thirties had a pair of knee-high wooden boots put over his original leather boots, with several holes in them.

On Ronan's side, the same thing appeared on Kate Pierre's leg. Then, wooden nails appeared in mid-air, each nail being driven into a hole, and then they began to be driven in little by little, as if someone outside was forcefully hammering the nails.

Normally, this wooden nail wouldn't be able to penetrate the body of a high-level mage, which has a defensive membrane and is already very strong. But somehow, the wooden nail still managed to go in a bit.

Now Ronan understood. This punishment had a magic-breaking effect. Although the third-tier mage had withstood it, the wooden nail had only gone in a small part, but his calves already had more than a dozen bloody holes, and blood was constantly gushing out.

This injury isn't serious for a mage of this level; he'll fully recover in a few days. But clearly, in the battle that will inevitably follow the end of this game, his mobility is practically nonexistent.

On the other hand, Kate Pierre didn't care at all. She even felt a little sorry that the wooden nails hadn't pierced her flesh, otherwise she would have received a workers' compensation.

The first round ended like this.

In the second round, the word on the roulette wheel became "arrival".

Ronan received three different cards: the man with the most hair, the man with two children, and the man with the highest rank.

There's not much to say. Ronan played the card of having the highest rank of nobility. After all, he is a marquis, and the only stable rank above him is a duke. Earls are on the same level as him.

On the other side, the player who played the card with the most magic power.