Humans had been trying to subjugate me since that day.
The lights at Millenia’s factories never went out.
It was because I had mobilized all production capacity to mass-produce industrial goods and started selling them to other countries.
The factory workers were complaining about how hard it was…..
“I hear the factory is the best place to earn money these days?”
“All the races with some strength have flocked there.”
“They pay you according to how much you work, how generous is that!”
“Long live the great Teonar!!”
There weren’t really any comments like that.
It was thanks to Mel, who actively introduced concepts like incentives.
“I know Teo-nim is generous, but isn’t this too much? They’d work like dogs even without pay…”
“Then how are we different from humans?”
“That’s not what I mean, I’m just saying we should reduce the bonuses a little. Then this lair would be overflowing with gold in a day~.”
Mel, in fact, complained that I was giving too much away, but
“No. If we do that, a ghost might wander Millenia.”
‘We absolutely can’t cause internal strife with ideology.’
I insisted on treating the workers well.
If I messed up, it’d be like that balding old man’s Communist Manifesto.
I thought someone would start saying things like, ‘Workers of all countries, unite!’
‘…Come to think of it, there’s someone a little suspicious.’
Drain, the dwarven craftsman I got back from Arkenia last time.
He looks exactly like the father of full communism.
Starting with his abundant beard, he’s already secured an 80% sync rate in appearance.
Perhaps due to the aftermath of suffering in the mines, he even said strange things to Wiz.
Things like, ‘Wouldn’t it be heaven if everyone shared everything equally?’
As someone from a free democratic country, I couldn’t help but be horrified.
I immediately raised the treatment of the workers significantly.
Even if a second Karl Marx was born, at least he wouldn’t be able to ideologically shake Millenia.
“Still, production has definitely increased.”
‘I wouldn’t have been able to keep up with exports without this.’
The move brought about a positive chain reaction.
Improving worker treatment directly led to increased production and exports.
It was so exemplary that I suspected someone was manipulating it to look good for me.
[Silvi? What are you doing here?]
[I heard someone collapsed while working, so I’m on my way to drop off some glucose candy.]
[Worked until they collapsed? Did someone force them to work?]
[No, they said they couldn’t stop working because they thought it would become a weapon to kill humans. I guess that rumor spread around the munitions factory.]
[……………..]
‘We have a long way to go, really.’
There were other reasons why production increased, but
This was something that even Lucia’s ‘socialization’ couldn’t stop.
The root cause was the inherent hatred of humans within us.
To solve this…
“Anyway, Mel? Did you handle the copyright fees well?”
“Yes! Now a portion of the sales will revert to the national treasury.”
“Then we can start.”
-Heh heh.
“A real cultural invasion.”
I have to change the culture steeped in hatred.
Inside and out, completely.
* * *
The first thing I started with was preparing to print books.
Wiz made metal type, and it’s true that we can actually print books.
But this only laid the foundation for the printing industry.
Mass production was a very different story.
“Wiz, how’s the metal type production going?”
“I’m sorry. I haven’t met the quantity you requested yet.”
“It can’t be helped. There are so many types.”
The advantages of Hangeul are so obvious that it’s pointless to mention them, but there’s one disadvantage that matches it.
Depending on the consonant, vowel, and batchim, there are really many combinations.
In total, there are a whopping 11,172 characters.
Even if you only extract the characters that are frequently used in real life, called ‘complete form’, there are 2,350.
Of course, I instructed Wiz to only make the complete form for now, but…
How could making that many metal types be done in a day or two?
Doing it by hand is out of the question.
Even though I converted an entire railroad factory for metal type only, it took some time.
Of course, it didn’t take that long, but
“Lucia? Are you ready to print the manuscript I gave you?”
“I’m sorry! Teo-nim told me to, but the imps are lazy…”
-Fzzzt.
“Please wait just one minute! I’ll ‘sharply’ urge them to hurry!”
“Don’t harass the innocent kids. Typesetting and composing take a long time, that’s normal.”
Typesetting and composing. The process of arranging and fixing the type according to the content to be printed on the type plate.
This is another time-consuming task.
For example, to write the two letters ‘animal’?
You have to pick out the ” and ” that are embossed from among the 2,350 metal types.
The letters themselves are smaller than the size of a fingernail, and after using them a few times, they’re covered in ink and hard to see.
There’s no way the work could be done quickly.
Even bringing in imps with good eyes and dexterity and making them do it was sluggish.
It would be a big problem if the letters got mixed up in the middle, even more so.
So much so that the imps were complaining.
“My eyes, my eyes hurt so much…!”
“My hands are stained black with ink!!”
“It’s truly a (murder-imp-like) labor!”
The imps were upset even though they were receiving sufficient wages.
It was a natural reaction.
Unlike the factory, where the results are immediately visible, typesetting is simple repetitive labor until it’s printed.
They’re doing that for hundreds of pages, so there’s no way they wouldn’t get tired.
Their expressions were getting gloomier day by day, and it felt like they were even feeling a sense of futility in this work, but…
-That reaction didn’t last long either.
“Everyone, you’ve worked hard! Here, receive this!”
“Milanoi-nim? I want to ask what this is.”
“A gift from the great Teonar-nim to the hardworking imp soldiers! It’s the first edition!”
The book in their hands before long.
The title written in stylish Hangeul on the cover was,
[Animal Farm – George Orwell]
The classic masterpiece that I remembered word for word, Animal Farm.
It was the first target for mass production that I carefully selected.
Of course, the imps looked like they didn’t know what it was, but
“Animal Farm? Are you talking about Aurelia-nim’s chicken farm……”
“Well, read it first! And be sure to tell me your impressions!”
Their leader, Milanoi, forcibly handed over the book.
She had already read it, and
“Ew. I don’t want to read it. I don’t want to even look at Hangeul for a while.”
“Teonar-nim directly instructed Milanoi to do this?”
I ordered it.
I was a little unsure with just my vassals, so I asked for some opinions.
To see if it was read as I intended.
“Teonar-nim…?”
“If you don’t follow it, you’ll be fried by Lucia-nim, not me. I’ll be an imp skewer too!”
“H-Heek!! I understand!!”
“We’re all going to gather and read it together today!!!”
That’s how the book was put in their hands.
How this will be read by the general public…
We’ll have to wait and see.
* * *
That evening, the imps gathered closely together.
It was for the reading that Milanoi had ordered.
“It’s amazing that what we did turned into something like this!”
“It’s like magic that you can just stamp this and it comes out.”
Surprisingly, the atmosphere wasn’t bad.
At first, they said they didn’t even want to see Hangeul anymore, but in the end, this was the result of their hard work.
Most of them were curious about what the content was.
“By the way, George Orwell? Who is this strangely drawn human?”
“It’s obviously the great Teonar-nim!”
“Indeed, there was a reason why Milanoi-nim held the book so respectfully!”
One more thing in addition.
As always, this time too, Teo was mistaken for having written the book himself.
I was well prepared for that.
I printed a self-portrait so they wouldn’t be mistaken, and even wrote the life story of the author George Orwell in the introduction, but…
[—For reference, he is an author completely unrelated to the dragon Teonar.]
“As expected, it was Teonar-nim!”
“Even her awkwardness at lying is very likable!”
As always, the other races didn’t listen.
Only Teo, who had suddenly become a plagiarist, was wronged.
“Then where…”
-Rustle.
Anyway, the imps started turning the pages.
Thinking that it wouldn’t be very interesting.
That thought was shattered in a few seconds.
“……?”
‘I thought it was about animals, but this is completely about other races.’
The beginning was unusual.
A pig who received a prophecy. Animals gathering in groups of three or five.
It was like… looking at Millenia today.
The pig was Teo, or the orc that Teo first took in as a citizen.
The other animals also looked like the other races gathered in Millenia.
‘This is more interesting than I thought!’
“Q-Quickly, turn the page!”
Thinking that, the immersion suddenly increased.
Their interest was properly piqued.
[In England, no animal is free. The life of an animal is misery and slavery.]
[But is this merely part of the order of nature? Is it because our land is so poor that it cannot afford a decent life to those who dwell upon it?]
[No, comrades, a thousand times no!]
[Our soil is capable of supporting a large number of animals than do actually live upon it.]
[This single farm alone would support a dozen horses, twenty cows, hundreds of sheep.]
[All of them living in a comfort and a dignity that are now almost beyond our imagining.]
[Why then do we continue in this miserable condition?]
[Because nearly the whole of the produce of our labour is stolen from us by human beings.]
[There, comrades, is the answer to all our problems.]
[It is summed up in a single word—Man.]
[Man is the only real enemy we have.]
Once they concentrated, the content started to be read quickly.
Everyone held their breath and took in the content.
The absorption was so great that even the inattentive imp was concentrating.
[Is it not crystal clear, then, comrades, that all the evils of this life of ours spring from the tyranny of human beings?]
[What is to be done, then?]
[Why, work night and day, body and soul, for the overthrow of the human race!]
[That is my message to you, comrades:]
[Rebellion!]
While the imps were absorbed as if possessed.
The pig in the book, the other races.
Declared that they would rebel against humans, and…
[In a very little while the human beings were sprawling all over the yard, and then they were scampering in all directions.]
[They had been routed.]
[The farm was theirs. Everything that they saw was theirs!]
Soon, the dream that other races have once wished for.
They drove out the humans and achieved the miracle of becoming the owners of the land.
“Waaaaaaaah!!!”
“What’s written here is a hundred times right! Humans are our enemy!!”
“I understand now why you told us to read this!!!”
“—Humans must all die!!!!”
The imps were ecstatic.