I will be crowned king

Anson absolutely agrees with this. No matter how outrageous the news is, as long as it spreads fast enough and widely enough, it can still produce terrible power - from the Hantu War to the Clovis City riots, previous major events have proved it again and again. This is the truth.

Whoever controls a more powerful voice channel and whoever can occupy the high ground of public opinion can increase his own advantage before the war begins and at the same time exert countless pressure on his opponent.

Under the ancient laws of the Ordered World, the emperor, as the legal "Guardian of the Ordered World", is the absolute leader in public opinion. When he raises the banner of defending the Seven Knights and imposes sanctions on a certain country At that time, it is literally the case that those who obey will prosper, and those who go against will perish.

Even if Clovis blocked the empire's offensive again and again, even if Hantu defeated the imperial expeditionary force and successfully established the country, what followed was an isolated position in the world of order: as long as the emperor did not lift the state of hostility and war, all empires would The principalities, independent cities and free territories will no longer have any honest dealings with you, and all commercial trade and official exchanges will come to an abrupt end.

Even because of the absolute supremacy of the emperor himself in the world of order, your subjects and vassals may resist your rule, openly raise their voices of protest and even take action - Clovis's The Northport riots are a good example.

And due to the accumulation of time, even a slight setback will not affect the credibility of the emperor himself; the same news coming from the Clovis Privy Council has a completely different effect than the emperor himself.

In contrast, Sophia Franz took a completely different direction: No matter who you are, whether you want it or not, believe it or not, I will let you know the news I want to announce.

Through running the media industry in Clovis City for the past few years, Sophia has summarized a very efficient way of spreading news by spending money.

The first is technological improvement, building printing machines with better efficiency and better effects, adjusting the formula of printing ink, purchasing higher quality and cheaper pulp raw materials, and maximizing output while reducing costs.

Yes, the output... In the past, most newspapers in Clovis were only sold in the inner city. There were only so many citizens willing to pay for newspapers. In addition, some newspapers claimed to be "noble-born" and exclusively served the upper class adults. , the quality of the paper, whether the printed and dyed handwriting is clear, and even whether the wording is standard and elegant, and whether the content is substantial, are all important indicators of the quality of a newspaper.

But in Sophia's eyes, none of these are the key. The key is sales, sales, sales!

If someone else's newspaper can sell 100,000 copies, and I can sell 1 million copies, then I will be the one who has the right to speak in public opinion. The paper is of poor quality and the printing is blurry? Then print the characters larger. Other people's newspapers have two pages and four sides, but I have four and eight sides, and the content is completely overwhelmed.

Others charge five copper coins for a newspaper, and there are fifteen or twenty copper coins for a better-quality newspaper. I only need one. With just one copper plate, I can buy four eight-sided newspapers—what you usually buy Four pieces of paper are worth more than one copper coin!

Of course, as a media tool, newspapers also have inherent limitations: words.

Although Clovis has tried to popularize education as much as possible, and the Circle of Order has also worked hard to promote "literacy" as an important religious cause over the past few hundred years, the reality is that seven out of ten civilians at the bottom are still illiterate. People who can read, or at most know their own names, and let ordinary people who can't read take the initiative to buy newspapers, it is indeed a bit magical.

But Sophia still has a solution: Can't read? That doesn't matter, you know the pictures, right? Increase the layout and quantity of comic strips in newspapers, stipulate that each news must be accompanied by at least one illustration, and major news should start with three.

Increasing the number of hand-drawn illustrations in text typesetting and printing will obviously greatly increase the cost, and this is why Sophia invested in advance to improve printing technology - facts have proven that industrial reform can achieve both what is needed and what is not. As soon as possible, the quality is good.

At the same time, the editors and writers hired also put forward corresponding requirements. The grammar and wording can be standardized, but it must not be cumbersome. The words and sentences can be as simple as possible. Two words can never explain more than five meanings. All news does not need Let readers really fully understand the details, and just have a general idea.

According to Sophia's own understanding and observation, among a hundred newspaper readers, at most two or three like to inquire deeply. Most of them use it as a source of discussion when they see the news. Once they know it, they will know it. Will think about it carefully.

Even if you publish repeated news two or three months apart, they won't notice at all.

Based on this, Sophia even publicly asked her newspaper to "re-publish" certain specific news every two or three months to ensure the content of the current newspaper and at the same time help readers "enhance their memory."

Of course, there is still a big gap between selling one million copies and selling one million copies. Especially Sophia's core purpose is not to make profits, but to influence and create public opinion, so the newspaper must be maximized. Sold to everyone.

For this purpose, she learned the trick that the "Clovis Truth Newspaper" had played before, and held a lottery draw in each issue of the newspaper. The winning number was the corresponding newspaper number of the current issue, and the grand prize was one thousand gold coins.

What, the grand prize is too far away and I feel like I can’t win it? It doesn't matter, as long as you can match the number of a position, you can win the minimum bonus of five copper coins - enough to sell five newspapers, and your probability of winning the next issue will be greatly increased!

However, this routine can only be used in towns and trains - Sophia has used her power and connections to find ways to promote it across the country - and the effect on towns and foreigners is obviously much smaller.

But it doesn't matter, because Sophia has another solution: the caravan.

From large chambers of commerce that engage in cross-border trade to small itinerant vendors between towns and villages, the newspaper stocks of major newspapers are open to all of them without distinction. They can buy as much as they want. If you buy more, you can get further discounts.

What, why do they want to buy a newspaper, and specifically buy your newspaper?

Of course it is used for packaging!

The newspapers sold by Sophia are cheaper than buying a piece of paper directly. They are also large and thick and can not be torn easily. They are perfect for packaging goods. They are small enough for customers to buy a few oranges and a few biscuits in a package. From the mezzanine inside the cargo box to the outer packet, newspapers can be used - or in other words, anything can be used.

Not only that, Sophia, who is very imaginative, even tried her best to contact many pubs, restaurants and cafes to promote the so-called "newspaper lunch box" - using newspapers to wrap biscuits, sausages and other meals, and then put them on wooden trays Or put it in a small basket; this way if the guests haven't finished eating, they can just pick up the newspaper package and pack it away.

It is easy for ordinary people to follow the crowd, especially when they find that this kind of thing is convenient, affordable and easy to use. In many cases, there is no need to force it at all and just let nature take its course.

Of course, in addition to this, it is also necessary to spend hard money... directly offer prices to major chambers of commerce. As long as they can sell bundles of newspapers to the empire, the newspaper companies will not only charge no cents, but can even provide subsidies.

In other words, unlike the imperial emperor who established prestige and absolute authority from the top down, Sophia Herred followed a standard bottom-up approach, with a huge scale and amazingly fast efficiency; not only was it successful, Go ahead and even form a crushing situation.

By the time the empire realized the seriousness of the problem, it was already too late... Even if they wanted to block it, these newspapers had already flowed into the major principalities, free territories and autonomous cities in the empire by the thousands; even the emperor We cannot directly intervene in the internal affairs of these places and force them to hand over their newspapers.

But even if you hand them over, it's useless... Just the number of these newspapers and the scale of their dissemination, you can imagine how many people have read them.

……………………

"Times...have changed!"

In the palace of Snapdragon City, Bernard Maulvis sighed heavily: "Gone are the simple and honest country farmers in the past, the obedient merchants who didn't even dare to breathe when they stood in front of the knights. Come back!"

"In the current empire, the tenant farmers are cunning, the merchants are tyrannical, exploiting the middle and lower class knights with usury, and they naturally wear the clothes that only the high-ranking nobles could wear in the past. The citizens of the autonomous cities unscrupulously run their small city-states into independent kingdoms. They always talk about 'free will', alas..."

"Count Bernard, please also exercise restraint in the presence of your Emperor."

In the elegant garden pavilion, Joseph Heritage...more accurately, Joseph III looked a little ugly: "I brought you here to discuss the recent troubles with you, not to listen to you recall the beautified past. .”

"I'm extremely sorry, Your Majesty." Bernard quickly raised his chest and saluted:

"But with all due respect, given the current situation, there is really no good solution. The crazy Clovis people are almost committing suicide to slander Her Royal Highness Princess Anne Herred. "

"Even if we could now produce mountains of ironclad evidence and put it directly in front of everyone for them to see with their own eyes, the situation would not be reversed; people will only believe what they want to believe, whether it is true or false."

"Are we just going to allow them to tarnish the dignity of the Hereid royal family, and still have us pretend that everything is normal?" Joseph III's face was as dark as water:

"I hope you can understand the seriousness of the matter, Count Bernard. This involves more than just the royal honor; because of the malicious slander of this group of Clovis thugs, the cause of protecting the world of order has also been shaken."

"But Your Majesty, the other party has Archbishop Clovis personally testifying."

Bernard reminded in a low voice: "If we want to solve the problem, we must also find a way to get the church to come forward."

"Do you think I didn't think of it?" The emperor snorted coldly:

"After the incident, I immediately found the Archbishop of Xiaolong City, but he refused to come forward in person no matter what, and insisted on waiting for a reply from the Holy See."

"He seems to have forgotten that this is a war. We are fighting a war with the Clovis people! Time is extremely precious. Every day we delay, the Clovis thugs will grow stronger!"

"Now those free territories and principalities finally have a reason. They insist on waiting until the matter is clarified before sending out troops to respond to the call. Fernando Herred died in the Red Moon Fortress inexplicably. God knows what happened to that damn traitor in Gloria. How did the other people in the legion work together to make the breakthrough that could directly determine the outcome of the battle and completely destroy Clovis fall short in the end!"

The more the emperor spoke, the angrier he became. Not only had the hard-earned excuse to declare war now become a stain, but his carefully trained legion now also had serious problems. Now that they could work together to get rid of the commander in order to avoid the responsibility of defeat, God knows what else they could do. What a terrible thing happened!

Bernard, who was silent, was also surprised... This was not because of the shamelessness of the Clovis people, but because the news spread so fast; no matter how much money the other party spent, those newspapers should not be as short as It takes more than ten days to produce such a huge effect, unless...

He suddenly remembered the Levent family, which had suffered great misfortune in the previous New World Holy War. As one of the four families with the highest participation in the Holy War, apart from them, the rest of the Bernard, Dukaski, and Roland families seemed to Everybody got some benefit from it.

The Bernard and Roland families were in the north of the empire, and the Dukaski family was in the center. The news this time started to spread first, and it seemed that it started from certain areas in the center.

Could it be...

"I have made up my mind to formally convene a knight's round table meeting to formally define this war." The emperor suddenly said:

"The complete eradication of the Clovis thugs is by no means a private matter of the Herred royal family or the Osterian royal family, but is related to the entire Order World tradition and the key to whether the ancient laws can be continued."

Joseph III was worried and stared at Bernard with solemn eyes: "I am definitely not alarmist... The chaos of the three countries in the North Sea and the turmoil of the colonies in the New World are the best evidence; the ancient order is undergoing its most severe A severe test, and if it fails, the empire may even cease to exist."

"My dear Bernard, the environment we are familiar with, the basic principles of various matters and morals in this incident, and even the status we have all follow the ancient laws left by the seven knights."

"Once the Clovis thugs succeed, it will eventually lead to more and more gangsters who are dissatisfied with reality and take advantage of the opportunity to act; the common people will rebel against the nobles, the vassals will rebel against the lords, and the believers will question the church... The entire world of order will fall into unprecedented darkness!"