第４０４堀：ゲートの経済説明と溜まる悪感情 (Part2)
"…So, the final result? Ria, do you understand?"
"Hmm... Oh, I see. We originally set them up to suppress wars, right?"
"Yes."
"Even if it hasn't reached the New Continent yet, wars are still occurring on the Weed continent. However, as we know from Comet's reports, that isn't exactly ideal. The original purpose of installing the gates was to suppress the gathering of magical power—which fuels war—and to earn DP through the dungeons. As expected of you, Yuki-sama. Your foresight in already implementing such a thing is truly magnificent."
No, I wasn't really thinking about magical power. My goal back then was just to collect DP under the guise of war suppression and economic circulation. Don't put me on such a pedestal, Samantha.
"…That still doesn't explain why the money increased."
"That's true. Well, that was my original intention. As for why the money increased... it's because the effects of war suppression and economic circulation took hold."
"What do you mean?"
"…Explain it simply."
Honestly, I thought I was being pretty simple already. But I suppose it’s natural that they don't get it.
"It seems you two don't quite grasp how war suppression and economic circulation stimulate growth. You understand that because war is suppressed, any country that carelessly picks a fight now risks its own destruction, right? So, in that situation, where should a country focus its efforts?"
"Oh, is that where the economy comes in?"
"…I see. Instead of increasing territory through war, which is the easy way, they have no choice but to increase national power by selling goods."
"Yes. That's not entirely accurate, but as Cleena says, it's not wrong to say it's about increasing national power. But honestly, the demand has increased overwhelmingly."
"Increased?"
"Ah, I get it. Since the gates made it easy to travel between various countries, there are more places to sell things."
"Yes, just as Ria says. There are more places to sell. So, countries decided to produce more, and now they are putting all their effort into producing their specialties. They don't need to wage war; they can just till the fields. It's much easier than killing each other. By suppressing war, we created opportunities for projects like land development for exports to other countries, which caused banditry to plummet and employment to expand. Because of that, the flow of money has become much more active overall."
"As a result, the annual balance of Weed, which handles all that war suppression and economic circulation, has skyrocketed. This result is the simplest explanation for why people can now travel with peace of mind, just as Ria said."
"“I see.”"
They both seemed to understand. In short, we’ve entered an economic war.
"I get it now. Everyone is working hard. I'm glad the wars are gone."
"Mm. Much healthier than killing each other."
"Yes, I would like to say that, but it's not that simple."
"Eh?"
"…Why?"
"There are places that aren't happy with the world becoming peaceful and people fighting against the earth instead of each other. These are mainly the countries that haven't joined the flow of war suppression and economic circulation through these gates."
"Um... I don't get it."
"…Same here."
"To put it simply: these are countries that think, 'If we were still at war, we could easily conquer other nations, gain military glory, and expand our territory.' Since we built this alliance system using the gates, even small nations are safe from being picked off as long as they join. Of course, countries with such ambitions have no intention of joining this alliance. They’ve been forced to swallow bitter pills by us in Weed."
Yes, our work from here on out will mainly involve dealing with those kinds of countries.
"According to Kirue, agents from those countries have already infiltrated our territory."
"Eh!? Isn't that a huge problem!?"
"…I'll catch them immediately and have their heads."
"We can't just do that. We don't have solid proof yet. Besides, we were too busy in the New Continent to investigate such things."
"Well, that's the situation. Our future work will mainly involve coordinating with the police to find out which countries they are and what they're planning. First, we need to carefully examine the information Kirue and Sasari have gathered."
With that, I pulled a stack of reports off the shelf and dropped them with a heavy thud.
"Eh? Could it be..."
"That's right. Reading these is your first job."
"…I'm going to the library."
"I-I'm going to the library too!"
The two tried to escape, but Jessica and Samantha caught them, and they were forced to start looking through the mountain of reports.
Well, I suppose I should get to reading as well. The most troublesome among them will likely be the country ruled by a god, just as Luna mentioned.
...It sounds like a massive headache, but I suppose I'll have to send an envoy to open a dialogue. Let me see... according to the documents Luna gave me back when we were with Noble, the gods and Dungeon Masters currently existing on this continent are...
Goddess of Love, Lilishe: Still around, but they're mostly useless. Same for the others.
Sword God, Nogosh.
Magic God, Nonoa.
Agricultural God, Faide.
Beast God, Gota.
Dungeon Master, Reye: Too much of a shut-in, low hopes.
Dungeon Master, George: Same, a total hikikomori.
And several others.
Yeah. It’s only going to be trouble.
This will be our problem moving forward: dealing with the clandestine activities of the countries that didn't join the Gate Alliance. And, of course, we’ll be tying up the loose ends we left behind—like that idiot princess from Taiki's neck of the woods...
But for the next few chapters, we're dealing with pitfalls.
Because it's summer, after all!!