Emperor Yurnero's departure shook the entire Orc Empire. It shocked the orcs even more than Sui Xiong's earlier destruction of the Isis organization.
Over the past century and more, under the leadership of this "frail scholar," the Orc Empire had steadily grown stronger. Its national power flourished, and the construction of its institutions became ever more orderly.
To say nothing else, if Sui Xiong had slaughtered his way from the westernmost edge of the Orc Empire to its easternmost edge during Hog Bell's reign, it would certainly have dealt a severe blow to the Empire's prestige, perhaps even plunging its rule into a crisis of collapse—because in those days, most of the Orc Empire's upper ranks, and even its local officials, were members of Isis.
But after Yurnero took the throne, the first thing he did was vigorously suppress this extremist organization and curb the spread of all kinds of extremist thought. Since Hog was still alive, he spared the former emperor's dignity and did not revoke the organization's official status. Yet through every possible means, he edged its members out of official posts at every level. It took more than thirty years before he finally reduced Isis from a colossal force capable of swaying imperial politics into a civilian organization with official standing.
At the time, everyone thought he was crippling himself, cutting off his own hands and feet. Later, when the Orc Empire fared poorly in its war against the Eagle Kingdom, even more people questioned whether this scholar could truly keep the nation under control.
But Yurnero soon made everyone understand that those doubts were wrong.
Broadly speaking, he advanced several major reforms.
The first was to strengthen agriculture.
The Orc Empire had always relied mainly on nomadic herding. This indeed made everyone in the country skilled