Deep Sea Embers

Tirian raised his head, staring at the confidential secretary in front of him with one eye, his face was full of "you're kidding me" expression.

The biggest pirate in Lengliehai only showed such a shocked expression when facing his own father.

He didn't touch the pages pushed over by the other party, but after calming down a little, he turned his head and glanced at General Liszt opposite.

The astonishment in this Frost General's eyes seemed no less than his own.

"It seems that this is really an 'unexpected news'," Tirian exhaled softly, and said calmly, "Even the 'general' in front of me doesn't know about this arrangement."

"Because this is not an 'arrangement'—it's just a suggestion, and it's just proposed," the confidential secretary lifted his gold-rimmed glasses, looked at Tirian solemnly and said, "Currently Frost The situation is complicated, and we don't have much time to discuss everything properly before implementing it, so I simply took the 'suggestion' here, and under the witness of General Liszt, we discussed the feasibility of this matter together .”

"Feasible? Do you really think this is feasible?" Tirian almost laughed out loud. He looked at the confidential secretary as if he was looking at a lunatic, "I, the leader of the Sea Fog Fleet, live on the cold sea. The most vicious pirate chief, you Frost people have almost adapted all kinds of horror legends to scare children from me in the past fifty years-now you tell me, you want me to be the consul of this city... ...Sir, we just fought side by side for a while, you may have misunderstood the relationship between us, right?"

"Fighted side by side, and jointly resisted the crisis that could lead to the destruction of the city-state. Now many people know that the Sea Fog Fleet stood up at the last moment and defended the city together with the navy. At this time tomorrow, the news will be passed to Han. In every corner of Frost, the city hall will tell people that the departure of the Sea Fog Fleet half a century ago was just a divergence of route, and the Iron Admiral who left angrily never completely let go of his duty to defend the city-state."

The confidential secretary paused here, and continued after confirming that Tirian didn't mean to interrupt: "Everything can have a new interpretation, and all changes will be arranged with appropriate reasons. You might think that this Transformation is unacceptable to Frost people, but in fact... Most ordinary people are not so easy to maintain their original intentions when faced with continuous and single-caliber propaganda, and the stability of life and the real improvement of order It will quickly overwhelm everything else, people's ideas can be 'customized', it just takes a little time."

After listening to all this patiently, Tirian looked into the eyes of the confidential secretary with a calm expression: "It seems that you are very good at this kind of thing."

"Every city-state is good at it—including Frost in the Queen's Era," said the confidential secretary with a blank expression. "It's not a simple idea to create a set of 'concepts' for the people that adapt to the current social environment and can relieve most people's psychological burden." It's a dirty thing, after saying nice words, it can neither maintain social order nor ensure the stable life of most people.

"Captain Tirian, the duty of the Town Hall has never been justice—the duty of the Town Hall is to keep as many as possible alive."

"... Let as many people as possible survive, she also said this back then."

"Yes, this sentence is still engraved on the door of the dome office-we overthrew only the queen, not those things that were right."

Tirian didn't speak for a while, he thought quietly, and after a long time, he slowly opened his mouth: "Why do you think I'm suitable for this position?"

"Initially it was Ms. Agatha's suggestion, but she only mentioned that you and your sea fog fleet might be able to help the city-state restore order—further decisions were made after urgent discussions within the city hall," the machine Ask the secretary to say, "Personally, I'm not really sure that you're the right person, in fact I'm even skeptical about it, but other people's point of view is that . . . Before being named 'Pirate', it was the general of the Frost City State, and since the history of this city, one-third of the monarchs or consuls have come from the military."

"You still think things are too simple," Tirian shook his head, "It's not a question of whether the candidate is suitable or not, but the sum of a lot of 'historical problems', even if, as you said, people The concept can be customized, but you also said that it will take time - Frost doesn't have this time, the city must restore order as soon as possible, so you still have to..."

"Captain Tirian," the confidential secretary interrupted him suddenly, "before you explicitly refuse, let's take a look at what I have brought. This may give you some new insights into the 'feasibility' of this matter." view."

Tirian was taken aback for a moment, and it was the first time that he carefully examined the pages of documents that the other party had just put on the table.

Those files do not have gorgeous titles and exquisite covers. After opening the simple folder, there are only a series of "suggestions" written in plain language, as if stating facts.

Tirian glanced twice, and his expression visibly changed.

He quickly flipped to the end, closed it with a "snap", and looked up at the confidential secretary in front of him.

The latter still kept a calm face, and nodded slightly before Tirian could speak.

"First, the vision disaster encountered by the Frost City State was caused by the Annihilation Cultists, but its root cause was the unsafe mining of the deep underground mines of the City State by the Old City Hall in the past few decades, and insufficient safety measures were taken in the dark And the negligence or even concealment of the abnormal warning is the main reason for the deterioration of the situation.

"Second, the successive consuls knew about this matter and chose to conceal it for their own interests.

"Thirdly, the Sea Mist Fleet chose to leave Frost fifty years ago because of divergent routes. The reason for the divergence is related to this kind of 'illegal mining' and different attitudes towards foreseeable anomalous disasters.

"Fourth, successive consuls have systematically and persistently smeared and concealed the truth about the Sea Fog Fleet, in order to cover up the real differences between the two parties, and direct popular hatred to General Tirian personally, thus diverting people's attention to the mine issue. s concern.

"Fifth, Consul Winston is suspected of colluding with the Annihilation Cultists. Before the vision disaster occurred, he had received the news, but he did not make any effective response. Instead, he chose to defect. He will become the public enemy of the city-state. We believe that He has become a member of the Cult of Oblivion, and will be eternally wanted by Frost.

"Sixth, the new consul will reshape the order of the city-state, the investigation of the mine will start immediately, and the liquidation of the responsible persons who are still alive will also begin immediately."

Tirian didn't speak, just sat there like an extremely cold ice sculpture, staring into the confidential secretary's eyes, the heavy pressure in those eyes was almost breathless.

However, the confidential secretary just took a breath, and then took out another stack of documents from the briefcase he was carrying.

This document is thicker and has more content.

"This is the list," he raised his head to meet Tirian's heavy gaze, "the first half is the evidence required for liquidation, including some records of illegal mining in the mine, the cover-up certificate for abnormal warnings, and the investigation of the sea fog fleet. Distorted and uglified instructions, this part of the file currently only has a directory, but within three days, all evidence will be ready.

"The second half is mainly a list, including the responsible people who can be arrested and tried, and their corresponding 'criminal evidence'. Please rest assured that they are not innocent, but they are just charged with other crimes-but it doesn't matter, their real crimes It doesn't matter anymore, now the city-state needs them to 'collude with obliteration believers.' These people can be regarded as the 'criminal reserve' of the city hall.

"Finally, there are letters and some diaries, evidence of the collusion between Consul Winston and the Annihilation Cultists, some of which bear his signature."

Tirian didn't look at the second stack of documents handed over.

A cold mist slowly emerged around him, and the coffee table was gradually covered with a layer of fine ice crystals, and the exhaled breath of everyone in the room who could breathe was condensing into a white mist.

"...Who prepared these things?"

"Successive consuls," the confidential secretary said calmly, "each government will prepare one, and many 'alternative plans', not necessarily for you, but also for other successors, such as the next 'Rebel Army'. The last piece of information in front of you was left by the Consul Winston. Coincidentally, he also took the Sea Fog Fleet as one of his 'alternative plans', which is different from Agatha's The 'suggestions' brought by the lady coincided."

Tirian slowly put his hand on the document, the fine ice crystals almost froze the document into an ice sculpture, he raised his head and stared into the confidential secretary's eyes: "So, this can define Winston. "

"Frost has a saying that the dead must give way to the living," the confidential secretary said slowly, "General Tirian, you are not a native of Frost, but you should know this saying very well. If you give Winston The "qualification" of the consul and the previous city halls can quickly restore order in the city-state, so he and the previous consuls will not mind."