ALL NOVEL Chapter 370: Simultaneously
"I request a vote," said the Chief of Personnel.
Widevision, the Chairman of this meeting, nodded and said, "According to the rules, I see it fit to hold a vote on this important matter. Please write your vote on the ballot paper and drop it in the box."
The chairman was a rotating position among the two four-star generals, the permanent members of this committee; the other members were by law barred from serving as the chairman; theoretically, this commission would not be able to even hold a meeting without at least one four-star general acting as the chairman.
The committee was used to voting, so they always had a ballot and ballot box ready. A vote could be called under two circumstances: if a majority of the committee members at the meeting requested it or if a member requested a vote and the Chairman or Chairwoman approved it.
Any measure that received an absolute majority would pass, while measures receiving over 50% negative votes would fail. Measures that resulted in a tie or received less than 50% negative votes wouldn’t be counted as failed measures. The difference is that failed measures couldn’t be brought up again for months, while those that didn’t fail could be reconsidered repeatedly.
The current committee has only five members, but that does not mean it can't have more members. The composition of the committee is decided by the big bosses of the Military Leadership Commission; in the last few terms, in addition to the permanent members, they have appointed 3 others to the committee; but now that human civilization is in big trouble, they may appoint more members for the next term.
Each member took a pen, wrote their vote, and dropped it in the box.
Wide Vision took the box and began reading.
"First vote: Abstention.
Second vote: Abstention.
Third vote: In favor.
Fourth vote: In favor.
Fifth vote: Abstention."
"With two votes in favor and three abstentions, the measure failed to receive enough votes to pass," Wide Vision said.
Bright Light could only sigh. In her view, not preparing the treasure was a bad move, but the vote had already taken place, and she had to respect it.
"General Bright Light, I abstained this time, but if the situation changes, I will change my vote to in favor. Let's first gather intelligence regarding the wolf; it’s too soon to activate the treasure," said the Chief of Personnel.
Bright Light nodded and said, "Sure."
Wide Vision added, "The matter with the treasure is over; let’s discuss the next pressing issue."
The committee, known as the Crisis Commission, was responsible for discussing the most important matters regarding the survival of humanity. The matter with the legendary magic treasure was only one part of their agenda.
"A lot of suspicious activity has been reported around Moon City. The intelligence community has already confirmed the appearance of another demon king there, but they could not identify it. How should we respond?" asked Wide Vision.
"Simple! We should increase our intelligence personnel to find more information," said the Chief of Planning and Strategy.
"Wait a minute! Our intelligence personnel are already stretched to the max. We are desperately looking for the wolf beast's traces and tracking demonic activity worldwide. We cannot allocate more intelligence agents to Moon City," said the Chief of Intelligence.
The Chief of Personnel nodded and said, "What the Chief of Intelligence said is absolutely correct. We are operating at full capacity; there’s no way to send more resources to Moon City without diverting them from other missions."
"So, should we simply ignore it? Moon City is near our southern border; those two demon kings could be planning to attack us right now! We should immediately divert some resources from other areas to Moon City," said the Chief of Planning and Strategy.
"Look, the most pressing situation is the demonic alliance; we should focus on tracking the wolf beast," said the Chief of Intelligence.
"Let’s divert a few intelligence officers from the least important missions," Bright Light suggested as a middle ground.
After much debate, the two sides finally agreed on a compromise: to search for traces of the wolf beast with full power while restructuring the supply armies and diverting some personnel from them to Moon City. It didn’t need a vote; all sides agreed unanimously.
Votes were only called when a unanimous compromise couldn’t be reached. In fact, votes were rare, as they could usually get a consensus.
The issue of activating the magic treasure was one where a compromise was impossible. There was no way to activate it halfway; either they had to spend 500 million stones to activate it for one month, or they didn’t. Both sides had already decided in their minds long before the committee gathered, and nothing was left to debate. Even if they debated for ten hours, they wouldn’t have reached a consensus.
"Okay, let’s discuss the next matter," said Wide Vision.
"Recently, we discovered an underground human city in the far north. It’s suspected they have a legendary treasure in their possession, but they have already rejected our proposals for an alliance. What should we do about them?" asked Wide Vision.
"Let them be for now; we have enough issues as it is," said Bright Light. She had been familiar with this matter for a long time; the soldiers who found the settlement were under her command.
The other three agreed, and the matter was quickly decided.
Even though a legendary magic treasure would be extremely useful in their current predicament, the underground human settlement would never voluntarily hand it over. Taking the treasure would, therefore, require using force, which wasn’t worth the effort. Maybe in the future, when human civilization has spare manpower, they will try it.
Human civilization is very pro-human; it usually protects settlements outside the Great Wall, even those hostile to it. But when it came to precious legendary treasures, it would ruthlessly steal them with no mercy.
A legendary magic treasure can improve the overall strength of the whole human civilization; it's simply worth too much to be left in the hand of some minor human settlement outside the Great Wall; even better, after the human settlement loses its legendary treasure, it usually blames it on demons and then accepts human civilizations proposal, and accept their proposal and migrate into the great wall.
"The next matter is about…" Wide Vision began.
The Crisis Committee discussed for about another hour before adjourning.
...
Name: Mike
Age: 36/100
Bloodline Purity: 100%
Demonic Bloodline Mix: 120%
Combat Power Estimate: Error
Path to 121%: Error
Roll the Dice: 1 - 87%
"I can roll the dice again!" thought Mike, looking at his system interface. Of course, he wasn’t a madman, so he didn’t even think about actually rolling it.
"General, we lost! The 99th Army won the award; now they get triple rewards for the next ten years! I expected more from you!" Pan Killer, who again came in without permission, said.
"Well, maybe I’m not as good as you think. That aside, has there been any new mission?" asked Mike.
"No, but I heard that the Crisis Commission is preparing for restructuring; they might draw some of our best soldiers and use them for intelligence-related tasks," said Pain Killer.
"Don’t let them take anyone without my knowledge; we are short of manpower as it is," said Mike.
Pain Killer nodded; he would let his General know when the list comes out.
"Anyways, issue another one-person mission for me!" said Mike.
"General? Please don’t do it! It’s risky!" Pain Killer tried to persuade him.
"It’s an order!" Mike said in a stern voice.
Pain Killer could only obey. "Just… survive!" he said.
...
Moon City had been busy these days. Many demons had been coming and going, most of them demons with high blood purity. The reason remained a mystery for human civilization despite their efforts to find out.
Mike looked at the massive demonic city below. Compared to large-scale demonic cities, Moon City was far bigger. The city center alone had hundreds of palaces, all magnificent buildings rarely found even in the human world. In contrast, there were far fewer mud houses for muddle-blooded demons; obviously, the Moondemon preferred quality over quantity.
"Wait, this aura… this is… Skyfire?" Mike's eyes widened in astonishment. According to reports, Skyfire had been killed by the Moon Demon many years ago.
"How is it possible? Did she manage to come back to life, or did she never die?" Mike thought as he tried to make sense of it.
"Well, never mind! It won’t make any difference anyway! Let’s destroy the city; it doesn’t matter whether there’s one or two demon kings!" Mike shook his head, not bothering with it anymore.
Regarding his system, he had a few ideas.
The key question about his system was whether he could roll more than one die simultaneously. For example, could he drop them all together if he managed to unlock seven dice? In that case, even in the worst scenario, he would roll 1 on all seven dice for a total of 7, not any worse than his current power. If his theory was true, then he should get busy killing demons.
Unfortunately, his system had no manual, so the only way to find out was to actually get more than one die and see if it worked. That’s why he came here—to test his strength and unlock another die.
Thinking of this, he cast his Wolf Transformation spell.