BAM!
When Wilder appeared again, he was already in front of Sherilmo. He bent his knee and shot it out, a kick landing squarely in his abdomen! The force of the blow contorted Sherilmo's face, his eyes bulging. Before his body even hit the ground, he was sent flying backward again.
Wilder's figure flashed again, vanishing and then reappearing in pursuit.
Gritting his teeth, Sherilmo forced himself to refocus, his eyes locked on the impossibly fast figure hurtling toward him. He quickly raised his arms to block the incoming strike.
But in the next moment, Sherilmo felt a heavy weight on his shoulder. A hard, heavy hand had clamped down on him.
His pupils shrank.
So fast! When did he even move?
By the time he realized what was happening, it was too late to react. With an impassive expression, Wilder swung his arm violently, and Sherilmo's entire body was thrown through the air.
The onlookers' mouths fell open at the sight.
"Whoa, whoa! That's just insane!"
"Is that the boss's true strength?"
"Brother Sherilmo weighs two thousand pounds!"
"And he was just thrown like that! At that speed… he's like a human cannonball!"
Just then, the battle on the field shifted again. Proving himself worthy of his senior cadre rank, Sherilmo, even while being flung through the air at such a speed, managed to twist his body with his own strength mid-flight. He drove his clawed hands into the ground, sliding backward and carving two deep trenches before coming to a screeching halt.
"Good coordination," Wilder said tonelessly, appearing before Sherilmo. He lifted his foot and brought it down.
CLANG!
A clawed hand, wreathed in black Armament Haki, collided with Wilder's foot, producing the sharp sound of metal striking metal.
"Hmm… it seems you've improved quite a bit in this time. You've even learned Armament Haki," Wilder said grimly, the force in his foot suddenly increasing.
Clack! Sherilmo's body swayed, nearly falling. He quickly steadied himself, gritting his teeth to resist the pressure.
"Is this all you have? If this is it, you have no right to provoke your enemies, Sherilmo!"
Wilder raised his fist, imbuing it with Armament Haki, and brought it crashing down.
Sherilmo's pupils contracted violently. One hand was braced against Wilder's foot; he wanted to pull his other hand back to counterattack, but just then, his face froze. He felt his other hand had been caught by Wilder at some unknown point. His expression turned ugly.
It was too late to pull back. In the next second, Wilder's heavy fist had already slammed into his face.
"Aargh!"
For the first time since the fight began, Sherilmo let out a pained cry. Wilder had shown no mercy with that punch. Blood sprayed from Sherilmo's face from the impact.
Hearing the scream and seeing Wilder proceed to give Sherilmo a relentless beating, the onlookers couldn't help but shiver and look away.
"How brutal," Franpetar remarked, her face calm as she watched from among the other senior cadres.
"Brother Sherilmo…" one of the lower-ranking members muttered, covering his mouth with his hands, his eyes welling with tears.
THUD! A dull sound echoed across the field. Sherilmo was thrown once more by Wilder, landing like a dead dog in the distance and creating a crater.
"Ugh…!" Sherilmo lifted his blood-covered face, struggling to climb out of the pit. He staggered to his feet, staring at the approaching Wilder.
Wilder stopped in front of him, watching him silently.
"Whew! Is it over?" The onlookers breathed a collective sigh of relief and fell silent.
"Sherilmo, use your weapon," Wilder said faintly.
"What?"
The onlookers' eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. Their mouths hung open.
"He's… he's going to continue?!"
"But Brother Sherilmo is already beaten so badly…"
Sherilmo wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, his eyes filled with determination. He nodded, then pulled out two black leather gauntlets from his pockets. They weren't the bulky type; they were more like half-gloves, each adorned with five sharp spikes that glinted coldly in the sunlight.
As he put on the two gloves, Sherilmo's entire demeanor changed.
Wilder's gaze shifted slightly. Only he knew that Sherilmo had never fought with just his fists. He also used weapons, and these gauntlets were not as simple as they appeared; they had been custom-made for him by the Munitions Department.
As expected, once Sherilmo put on the gauntlets, a faint sound of winding metal gears was heard. A sheet of metal shot out from the ring-like opening, covering his entire arm before stopping.
Sherilmo took the initiative and attacked Wilder!
The battle resumed without warning! Sherilmo's fists moved in a flurry, his speed more than five times faster than before!
The tide of the battle had turned so suddenly that the crowd barely had time to react. But soon, they were watching with growing excitement.
They had no doubt that Wilder was overwhelmingly powerful. To see Sherilmo now launching such a fierce offensive against the mighty Wilder, how could they not be excited?
Sherilmo's punches became faster and faster, until finally, they became a blur of afterimages!
Wilder dodged the dense barrage of fists, moving backward as Sherilmo relentlessly pushed forward.
"Hah!" Sherilmo threw a heavy punch. Wilder tilted his head slightly, and the fist grazed past his ear. His expression remained placid, his evasive movements as graceful as a leisurely stroll.
The more Sherilmo fought, the graver his expression became.
The situation was not as favorable as it looked to the onlookers. Only Sherilmo himself knew the truth.
As time went on, Sherilmo gradually felt a numbness creeping into his arms. Wilder, however, continued to dodge, always avoiding his punches by the narrowest of margins. Even his evasive movements were so minimal that not an ounce of energy was wasted.
How… How can he dodge so easily? Sherilmo's expression grew frustrated. The more he fought, the more he felt his own weakness.
At that moment, he truly understood just how strong the boss was.
Wilder had been observing Sherilmo's expression and condition. Seeing that the time was right, his eyes flashed. The moment Sherilmo threw two punches, Wilder seized the opportunity. With a step, he charged forward, breaking through Sherilmo's guard and whispering, "It's over."
BAM!
The next second, a simple, direct, heavy punch was thrown.
"Gah!" Sherilmo's eyes bulged. His body flipped upward before crashing to the ground, his consciousness fading into darkness.
The fight was over.
The entire field was silent.
Wilder swept a cold gaze over his subordinates before his eyes finally settled on the senior cadres. He left them with a single sentence and turned to leave.
"Starting tomorrow, all senior cadres will begin hellish training of their own accord. In three months, we will hold a tournament. Anyone who has not improved will be demoted one rank."
"…"
The crowd fell into a stunned silence.
"Damn it! The boss is so ruthless!" After a long pause, Bacon wailed.
Wilder's parting words set off a storm within Morass. Every senior cadre began to push themselves to the limit. Training! Training! Training!
Fighting Sea Kings was no longer just for food; they threw their entire beings into it, striving to kill the beasts in the shortest possible time.
In a short period, the food they captured increased by half again.
Wilder himself, however, paid no mind to this. All he wanted was the result in three months. As for the process?
Anything was fine.
The days passed, and construction on the great road from the capital to the coast finally began.
The sound of rumbling echoed through the sky. The construction teams stretched from the outskirts of the 25th district far into the distance, with no end in sight.
Over a hundred teams worked on different sections simultaneously. They built bridges over water and used cannons to level mountains. Thirty-six thousand, eight hundred people participated in the construction of this road.
At the same time, there was activity in the undeveloped areas on the outskirts of the capital. Over a hundred researchers from the Agricultural Institute went to survey the soil quality, moving swamps to fill in sandy land and moving sandy land to fill in swamps. Over five thousand civilians also participated, opening up royal fields.
A month later, the first batch of second-generation Bread-Rice was finally ready! And with it came another piece of good news.
The first generation of Bread-Rice was ripe!
This meant that, from now on, the Kingdom of Morass was self-sufficient!
A sense of joy filled the still-desolate city.
Wilder couldn't hide his happiness either. He held a banquet that day in the 24th civilian district, drinking and eating meat with the common people, allowing everyone to see the king's approachable side.
With food, the crisis of hunger was temporarily alleviated. But now, he could no longer continue to provide for the people for free.
Wilder brought out the second-generation Bread-Rice seeds and exchanged them with the civilians for the ripened Bread-Rice.
Of course, he still needed to take care of the people, so the price he set was very low—the seeds for one acre of land could be exchanged for only two hundred pounds of Bread-Rice.
Across all twenty-four districts, the civilians had cultivated a total of six hundred thousand acres of their own land. Everyone exchanged for enough seeds, meaning not a single acre was missed.
Through this, Wilder collected one hundred and twenty million pounds of ripened Bread-Rice!
His income skyrocketed.
At the same time, the development of the royal lands—that is, the lands belonging to the Kingdom of Morass—was complete. A total of two million acres were all planted with second-generation Bread-Rice seeds. Civilians were hired to manage them, but the administrators were, of course, members of Morass.
But this entire process was a form of "reinvestment," and Wilder spent nearly two billion Beri on it.
Now, the total value of the national treasury, including the grain, was less than thirty billion Beri.
However, this was when the income would start rolling in. After having his men run the calculations, Wilder issued a national announcement setting the price of Bread-Rice. Everyone had to maintain the price and could not arbitrarily raise or lower it.
For now, though, everyone was self-sufficient, and grain was still a scarce and important resource. No one would sell Bread-Rice to others, and no one would buy it, since everyone had it.
But Wilder knew that with food comes trade. When people no longer have to worry about starving, they will start to want or need other things.
Trade would likely involve using some grain to exchange for other goods—a form of barter.
Wilder decided to start cultivating his own currency. He selected talented individuals from various departments and established the Bank of Morass, making it the authoritative institution for issuing currency and controlling the domestic economy.
After a period of research, they began printing currency with Wilder's portrait as the prominent symbol.
The quantity, of course, had been determined by prior investigation.
There were many bugs in this world's system. For example, currency. Was Beri the only one?
Of course not. But it was undeniable that Beri dominated the entire world. Outside of one's own country, a national currency was useless. No one would recognize it; it would be just a piece of waste paper, unless it was gold.
Should it only be used domestically?
That wouldn't work. How could they develop like that? How could they develop without trading with the outside world? But to trade with the outside world, they had to use the "authoritative" currency, Beri. But then, would they use Beri domestically, or their own currency?
Once they started using Beri, their own currency would be useless, because it would collapse. A million of their currency might only buy a single grain of Bread-Rice.
So, unless Beri lost its dominant position and was no longer the sole power—something that, according to the plot, wouldn't happen for at least another year or two, and even then wasn't certain.
And if they didn't create their own currency, it wouldn't really matter. After all, that's just how this world worked. Everyone was used to using Beri. Let the authority be the authority.
But the question was, was he willing to trade a pile of his own real goods for a pile of paper from others?
Actually, it wasn't so bad. Paper was paper. After all, they could use that paper to get real things from others outside. In the end, it was still essentially barter.
But Wilder was worried. What if the power that created Beri collapsed in a year or two? Who would still recognize it then?
Wilder thought about it and decided to hold off on issuing a domestic currency for now. The printed money could be stored away. He would deal with it in a year or two. For now, they would stick to barter.
However, the bank still had to be established. At the very least, it could be used to store Beri, right? Although there wasn't much Beri in the country now, they could exchange grain and gold for it, couldn't they? Gold was completely real currency. No one could refuse to recognize it.
As for how to handle barter domestically?
The capital had grain, but there were still poor people in other places. After all, not everyone was willing to leave their hometown. They lacked food. So, they would transport grain to these places and exchange it for other goods.
For example, a display of craftsmanship—earthenware jars, a type of wild vegetable not found in the capital, clothes, and so on. All of this could drive the overall economy of Morass and encourage people to do business.
And when these people's ambitions were no longer limited to the domestic market, their sharp gazes would turn to the outside world. Trade would begin. And once the volume became large enough, even Big Mom wouldn't be able to control it all.
Pirates and the like—was there any shortage of them in this world?
When the members of his Kingdom of Morass wanted to be pirates, they could be pirates.