Chapter 158: New Washington Conference

Chapter 158: New Washington Conference

After the Single Moon Festival, the New World had entered autumn. New Washington, the prosperous city with centuries of history stood peacefully in the autumn wind. The shops that used to be extremely busy were all shut and the elves were leaving the city in droves.
It had been almost half a month since the Single Moon Festival that was now being called Nightmare Day. No one in the city could forget what happened that night, when the sudden appearance of the blood moon shrouded New Washington in red. To the colonists, the new phenomenon was scary, but to the natives, it was terrifying.
At the heart of the city–the castle district–the skeletal corpses from that day had already been completely cleared out and all the skeletons were burned to dust. In order to prevent anything of the sort from happening again, Judge Academy had even inspected all the burial grounds from all those years ago, ensuring nothing was left out.
The academy’s response was swift, but they could not prevent the aftermath. It would be hard to turn things around in the short term.
In a great hall in one of the palaces, over ten Americans sat around a large round table, deep in intense discussions.
“In these two weeks, trade in New Washington has dropped by twelve percent, and daily necessities have pretty much stopped selling. If this continues, we’ll be really short on taxes this year.”
“Trade is one thing. What I’m worried about right now is our population! This is the data I just received from the city guard. In just ten short days, almost fifty thousand people have left New Washington! We only have a little over a million people in the city!”
“Population is very important to us. A lot of our facilities require a lot of our manpower, and most of our tax income comes from the natives. Surely, we can’t let our academy students be the ones doing hard labor. We need to prioritize this problem.”
“I’ve seen the data from the guards. There aren’t really that many natives leaving. The second and third generation natives are pretty much stuck here, their families and businesses are all in New Washington after all. What I’m more concerned about are the elves. Has everyone noticed? Since the day before yesterday, the elves in the city have been leaving in waves. All the elven shops have been on the market for a low price. It doesn’t seem like they plan on coming back!”
“How much longer do we have in our peace treaty with the elves?”
“We still have more than ten years. The elves are a race that puts great importance on trust and keeping promises. We won’t have to worry about them breaking the treaty.”
“How about after the treaty is done? What if the elves don’t extend it?”
“This is not the time to be discussing something that will happen in more than ten years. Don’t stray too far from the main point! Everyone here needs to think about how we can save our coffers this year!”
“Enough!” A furious voice bellowed in the noisy hall. A man who was sitting in the furthest corner stood up. He was dressed differently from everyone else; he had a full suit of silver armor on and his helmet was on the table as he looked on impatiently.
“All of you are busy discussing our population, finances and our treaty with the elves. I think you’ve all been away from the academy for too long. Have you forgotten who we are?”
There was a stir in the great hall. An old man stood up and said, “Captain Harry, this meeting is about the governance of the city, and you’re the captain of the dragon-eagle knights. The military doesn’t really have anything to do with this conference. If it wasn’t for the fact that you claim you have something important to report, we wouldn’t even have invited you here today!”
Harry coldly smiled and said, “Don’t forget that we are colonists! If we lack manpower we can capture more, if we lack finances, we can plunder. As for the elves, what’s so scary about that weak and useless race declaring war on us!”
“Harry, what do you mean by this. Speak up if you have something to say. You don’t have to cause a scene!”
Harry took a deep breath, pushing back his anger as he said, “You’ve discussed so much today, but you seemed to have forgotten something very important! Lilith has been missing since the incident, and we haven’t seen any trace of her. Is no one concerned?”
“Ah, Lilith. You know how that girl is. She does what she wants to without any concern for law and order. She’s probably met some opponent that caught her interest and left New Washington on her own. She’ll be back in her own time,” the man said dismissively.
Harry’s face once again filled with anger, “It seems that none of you know how important Lilith is to Judge Academy!”
“We know how important Lilith is. Captain Harry, I understand how you feel, but we’re already past the era where the colonists can rely on only war. The economy is equally as important, and everything we do here is also for Judge Academy.”
“Speaking of which, was that the important matter you needed to report today?”
Harry took another deep breath before shaking his head and saying, “That day, other than Lilith disappearing, a student from the Dawn Academy that we invited went missing as well.”
The short man closest to Harry had almost fallen asleep, but at Harry’s words, he immediately opened his eyes, adjusting his butt to a more comfortable sitting position before slowly saying, “The Foreign Affairs Department is responsible for this matter. The student is named Xiao Lin, and we invited him to work with Professor Brown. After the blood moon, Captain Harry and I interrogated the student who was possessed day and night, but we’ve not made much headway.”
A man with glasses stood at the focal point of the table; he seemed to be the chair of the meeting. He furrowed his eyebrows and said, “Dawn Academy? That will be troublesome. We have an alliance with them, and it shouldn’t be compromised by this. What year and skill level was that student at?”
The short man answered, “He’s a new student, not even at the Black Iron-rank in skill. He needed our anti-gravity accessory and super potions to work in New Washington.”
The man let out a sigh of relief. “A new student? That’s no issue then. Can we keep it from Dawn Academy for now?”
The short man put up both his hands. “That’s what I have to report today. There are some complications with this matter. A department head from Dawn Academy was here with Xiao Lin, and that department head has already sent the news to Dawn Academy, so we won’t be able to keep it from them. A special investigation team from the academy is already at my department. I wish to ask city hall how I should proceed?”