Hermit Society.
It was a loose association whose members all styled themselves as outsiders, natural losers in the inheritance of titles and lands.
People like that were often especially passionate about reform. Any opportunity to carve a piece of meat from their elder brothers and sisters would have them flocking to it.
At first, it was merely a loose organization founded on the theories of an obscure scholar named Shang Boliang, hidden away in some unknown corner.
What truly made large numbers of outsiders take notice of it, and even join it, was a banishment order from the capital.
It was said that His Supreme Majesty had read its near-nonsensical content and personally written an article condemning the harm it posed to Ursus as a whole, publishing it on the front page of an authoritative newspaper.
Similar articles appeared twice.
Only then did the society become famous among the young, while Shang Boliang abruptly became a martyr, a symbol, an icon.
From then on, the Hermit Society rapidly flourished.
If Hoshino saw this, she would definitely call it a sly trick. The cost of spreading it was practically free.
Write the theories themselves, publish the books themselves, use this kind of suicidal publicity themselves, then place no restrictions whatsoever on its underground circulation.
Only an emperor could pull off such a mentally exhausting stunt.
And just a few weeks earlier, Demir had joined one of the Hermit Society's outermost branches.
By the time one of his letters had passed through countless hands and reached the imperial palace in the capital, Shang Boliang had already learned that Black Snake had entered the heartland of Ursus.
"Has there been no news from her Snake Scales?"
"Reporting to Your Majesty, Koschei's Snake Scales have been without a leader for a long time. We