COTE x Reincarnated As A Slime (On Hold)

Chapter 30

3rd POV

The Council of the West is a league made up of different nations surrounding the Great Jura Forest. The representatives elected by each nation would attend the meeting in Ingracia every month. Strictly speaking, unlike councils run by nations, the main goal of the council is to maintain everyone's financial interests.

They wouldn't put smaller nations on lower priority, and instead start off from the point of equality. People would cooperate with each other. All of the members aimed to uphold the idea of defending the good of all humanity.

The good of man referred to maintaining the circle of survival for humans. Apart from taking care of monsters, they also needed to handle droughts, plagues, typhoons and earthquakes. They had a duty to draft out plans to respond to crises.

Also, the policies on importing and exporting surplus food, specialties and other goods differed from nation to nation. Due to this reason, negotiation on these subjects became very difficult. Therefore, the council only discussed motions relating to actual rescue efforts.

If there was a famine, they would dispatch food to aid; if there was a large number of monsters, they would send reinforcements to aid them, and so on.

It was not easy, and it would potentially lead to a series of problems as well.

The council was funded by each nation, and the proportion obviously would differ. The fund would fluctuate depending on the size and scale of the nations, yet at the same time, all nations shared the same privileges. This led to some dissatisfaction, and therefore, the number of representatives for different nations needed to be increased when more responsibility was undertaken.

However, with no restrictions to this rule, nations were no longer equal to each other. Thus, another rule was set. For every new councillor added to the council, their percentage of the emergency fund would also be raised accordingly.

However, with more councillors in place, it obviously implied greater influence. The larger nations had long realised this point, and would give away several times more money than they normally would just to have more power within the council.

As mentioned, the council's actions were not directly related to national interests. However, it was still a convenient venue for the more powerful nations to show off their strength.

The more say a nation had in the council, the more likely they could turn things to the favor of their own nations. And in times of crises, they would also be able to protect their own nations first.

Motions, such as the distribution of acquired funds, would be decided by majority votes within the council.

For example, let's assume some highly dangerous monsters have appeared.

The Freedom Association under the command of the council would take on the monsters.

The council would issue missions to eliminate the monsters and have the association hire adventurers. However, the monsters would not appear alone.

What if these dangerous monsters were to appear simultaneously in several kingdoms?

Obviously, larger nations with greater authority would enjoy the privilege of receiving protection first and getting the better skilled adventurers.

That was only to be expected.

The fact alone that they offered greater funding contributions showed that they were of higher standing among the Western Nations.

People didn't invest their limited resources to protect the useless. When they could afford it, they would help them, but if they couldn't, they would be cut off—as it stood, the weak were simply abandoned. This was merely the reality played out as a game of numbers.