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"I vote to extend the decision for two weeks, giving the disciples enough time to retouch on their enemy typings," Elder Lung said stubbornly once the core jury team had absconded to a pagoda on top of the mountain.
"Respectfully speaking," General Shroud said. "If we do not start training soldiers now, we will miss the time window when such training would have value. I refuse."
"It is true that with the new information, all of the scenarios become defunct in functionality," Elder Qin said, providing a more balanced perspective.
"Perhaps the exact thing that our enemy was trying to achieve when they concocted the infection," Elder Flower mused. "How to prepare for an ever-changing threat. Our dilemma is just a microcosm of the issues the whole Imperial defence force will be struggling with once they receive the entirety of the information. A good move from the demons. Wasting the time of those of us preparing, in a way, not preparing and working on general skills has just become a more rewarding decision."
"I disagree," the sect leader said bluntly. "Even incomplete preparation is better than no preparation. Anything worth doing is worth doing imperfectly."
"A week, just a week," Elder Lung compromised. "Otherwise, none of the scenarios will fit the requirements of reality."
"At least one already does," General Shroud pointed out.
"I'm somewhat hesitant to reward behaviour that is so at odds with what the briefing actually was," the sect leader admitted. "Just because the inner disciple achieved good results when going against the generally understood intent of the competition, does not mean we should reward such individualistic thinking."
"I thought that this whole gaffe was to promote the usage of Illusion Rooms to the army with cold hard numbers," General Shroud spoke up again. "I think that for that purpose, doing the most effective thing, rather than politically expeditious, would be the obvious course of action." He stared at the sect leader, who stared back. Neither of them seemed willing to back down.
"It's hard to argue that any other scenario currently fits better than Inner Disciple Jin's," Elder Flower said while disinterestedly looking at her nails. "But I guess meritocracy was never a core value of any sect," she said dismissively. "Just compromise and use both already," she said before closing her eyes to symbolically exit the conversation.
"My budget and men are not toys for your internal politics," General Shroud refused. "If one Illusion Room is more suited than the other, I will take that one."
"One week," Elder Lung muttered angrily.
"I think we all are interested in having the effectiveness percentage of the scenarios be as high as possible," sect leader Chun said soothingly, as if talking to a child. "It is hard to argue that other than the inclusion of the new mutation, Inner Disciple Jin's scenario is more suited for combat skills development than that of your protege," she said to Elder Lung, who seemed revitalised by the words.
He nodded excitedly. "Yes, of course, they're not comparable at all, and if they are, it's because that boy stole the work anyway. You've heard of the incident, of course-"
The sect leader cut him off. "Yes, we've all heard of the incident."
"The army is better in the other one, even if the zombies are worse," Elder Qin suddenly piped up. "I'd say they're about equal."
"The soldiers don't need training on how to fight with their allies, they already can." General Shroud waved him off. "But I would like to reach a consensus that pleases all of us as quickly as possible."
The sect leader bobbed her head while clasping her hands together in her wide sleeves. "I am sure that not all the soldiers need a morale boost. Perhaps those who don't can access the more combat-focused scenario. A simple recombination on our side would put the best of two worlds together. The accurate mutations and the better army, and the better combat systems. It is impossible for us to create Rooms for mortals considering their imitations, but working with the scenarios of those who can is manageable."
General Shroud looked at the sect leader, looked at Elder Flower, then looked at the still ruffled scribe at his side. Then he nodded. "For the price of one," he said warningly.
"Of course," the sect leader decided.
Flower, in the non-existent corner of the pagoda, kept her eyes closed. Perhaps if she didn't have to see the decision-making going into killing the idea of meritocracy, she wouldn't have to retch. If inner disciple Jin's rather brazen gamble had failed, she somehow doubted that Chun would have been so stricken at the unfairness as to elevate him to the position of finalist just because of her complaints.
Kill the Demon General, and all inequalities of life shall be lifted was the message to her.
Success can be manufactured, and I am equally supporting both factions, was the message to Elder Lung.
We're a fucking mess on the precipice of an internal crisis and you better be grateful you got out while you could, was the message to Shroud.
Elder Qin? Well, it was hard to say if there was any particular message addressed to him in particular. He was just a chill guy, seemingly disinterested in the decision-making happening in front of him.
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Jin and Hashimi, alongside the other disciples, had all found a place to rest as the sun slowly sank behind the horizon, leaving them in a darkness that almost didn't affect their qi-enhanced eyesight at all.
"What do you think they're talking about? They've been gone for an hour", Hashimi wondered next to Jin, where they were leaning against one of the buildings.
Jin, distracted from the qi he was pumping through his body to stay warm, hummed.
"Anyone in there?" Hashimi asked, waving a hand in front of his face.
"If I had to take a guess, they're trying to placate both sides. Conventional wisdom in the eyes of the Elders would dictate that Lung Junior's scenario is more suited to the task at hand since it is less transgressive of the norm. However, with this mutation, our scenario has just gained an edge. People probably complain that unforeseen events shifted the victory percentages," Jin calmly analysed.
"You think we might lose?" Hashimi asked.
Jin ran over the words that the sect leader had used when talking about their work. "Does not fit the context is the phrase that she used. The context of what is in the air," he suggested.
"What do you mean? She obviously meant the context of the army's requirements-"
"Ah," Jin interrupted. "But the sect leader is not the one who decides what the army's requirements are. It is the one context that she couldn't have been speaking of. After all, determining if the work fits the army's requirements is General Shroud's job."
Hashimi furrowed her brows. "What context did she mean then?"
"She's the sect leader. What context do you think she meant?" Jin replied. One thing he'd noticed in this world ruled by the strong and the relatively uneducated was… How important his high school and university courses actually had been in developing critical thinking skills and independent thought patterns. Of course, the school system was in many ways a mess, but it was obviously better than no school system at all. Most people wouldn't realise this because they lived in a bubble where everyone they met had likely at least finished the compulsory education of their country or state, but people who had never undergone any sort of rigorous education thought and analysed things very differently.
Jin would argue that in terms of societal harmony, places still developing education standards simply thought about things less rationally. Discrimination of any kind and emotional impulsivity had been the main takeaways he'd gotten anytime he'd visited a place like that back on Modern Earth.
"Sect leader," Hashimi said slowly. "Sect." She paused. "Leader." She smiled. "Ah, I see what you did there. But, how is us winning bad for the sect, or the leadership?" she asked.
Jin shrugged. Just because he'd noticed something didn't mean he knew the answer. The most specific thing he could say in this case was related to the fact that considering how older people in the cultivation world simply grew more powerful, rather than more dead, the society essentially stagnated with low levels of innovation. Power meant resources, and if age was power, then how would innovations ever catch on? Psychology had proven that people mostly solidified their world-view in their twenties, which was why the political opinions of generations often wildly differed. This was also one of the reasons why the baby boomers had been one of the most privileged generations in American history. Not just because they had been born into a time of unprecedented wealth, but also because due to their numerical superiority, they had taken the political world from their parents, whom they outnumbered vastly, in their twenties, and then, because they themselves had less children, had never experienced a time when the country hadn't been following what was essentially their vote.
Now imagine, if the twenties lens through which you were shaping the world today was 5000 years ago. Cultivation Elders were essentially super-hyper-mega boomers who could sneeze nukes and didn't even have to vote to gain power; they just had it.
"What's the thing that old people hate the most?" Jin asked rhetorically. He refused to believe that just because people in Cultivation Land grew older, they were any wiser for it. Everyone he'd ever known who was stupid when they were young had also grown up to be a stupid adult. If you didn't have functioning mental models by your twenties, you never would. Additionally, even if you were wise, time would inevitably leave you behind. If back on Earth everyone sucked up to rich people causing them to develop artificial psychoses and schisms from reality, then in Cultivation Land this was dialled up by 1000x. An Elder could do no wrong, literally.
"Young people?" Hashimi asked. "My grandpa always complained about everything I did."
The old hating the young, maybe, Jin mused. "Yeah, but what do young people represent?" he asked.
"Change," a new voice suddenly piped up, approaching them from the left.
Hashimi and Jin looked up to see that Francis, the oldest looking inner disciple, was ambling his way towards them. "Young people like us represent change," he said before laughing at the faces that Hashimi and Jin pulled at him, putting them in the same category. "I'm not a day over 200, and I'm still a young lad at heart."
"So what, you're saying the Sect Leader doesn't think that change is good?" Hashimi asked quietly, looking around suspiciously.
"Have you met anyone at the top of any hierarchy who likes change?" Jin asked rhetorically. "General Shroud seemed to like it, and Elder Flower was in our corner after the mutation was announced. Do you think it's a coincidence that these two were the youngest on stage?" he asked rhetorically before turning to Francis. "What do you think will happen?" he asked.
Francis stroked his white beard and opened his mouth. However, whatever he was about to say was interrupted by the reappearance of the Elders and the General.
Nobody was expressing any particular emotion; even Elder Lung had managed to calm down somewhat. However, the thing was that if you created a society where people didn't express much emotion, others would simply learn to read even smaller hints, and to Jin, nobody in that group looked particularly happy.
The sect leader stepped forward. "We have decided, in lieu of the very special circumstances surrounding this competition, to announce two winners. The General wishes to use the work of the inner disciple Jin to boost the morale of the troops and the work of Lung Junior to boost their combat efficacy. Considering that the mutation caught us all off guard, the new zombie variety correctly predicted by Inner Disciple Jin will be fused into that of Lung Junior to ensure coverage," she announced.
Nobody in the audience clapped or cheered.
"What?" Hashimi whispered, disbelief clear in her voice. The other disciples looked more stone-faced than usual, and Lung Junior looked like he would have had an outburst had it been anyone else speaking.
"Just because there are two winners does not mean the rewards will diminish. Both teams will receive the full amount of sect contribution points," the sect leader continued. She then smiled. "Congratulations, I am very glad to see such strong and innovative performances from the inner disciples of our sect. It gladdens me to see that the future is in good hands."
Jin looked on, almost apathetically, as the ceremony came to a close. Winning had been more than he'd expected to get, even if the podium was shared. But, well, when the mutation had been announced, he thought he'd gotten lucky.
But it seemed like the cultivation world had no luck, only backing.
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