“So those box monsters the other days were just combinations of vectors, called matrices!” Shuxue’s eyes glittered as he pressed a jade slip to his forehead. “The columns are the original variables of the system of equations, while the rows are new variables that relate the equations together! I can use this to create a multivariable attack that-”

“WHAT THE FUCK, SHUXUE!” The door to the throne room burst down, and the Sphinx strode in, dragging Zhujiao by the collar on one hand and holding the mangled corpse of an old man in the other.

“What?” Shuxue removed the jade slip from his forehead. “Eh, what’d you do to Feiliao?”

“THIS SHITLORD WAS RAPING LITTLE GIRLS!” The Sphinx roared. “This… this pedophile...”

Shuxue frowned. “I thought pedophilia was a common affliction here.”

“No, pedophilia is fine! The problem here is, he’s a rapist of women! Being raped is infinitely worse than being killed! If you stomped someone into mud in front of me, that would be fine. But if you raped someone...” The Sphinx threw Feiliao’s corpse onto the ground and began to stomp it into mud. “I ignored this earlier, but I can’t hold myself back any longer! Fuck your patriarchy, Shuxue! You’re oppressing women!”

“...” Shuxue was speechless. Where had this come from?

“Can’t you see I’m triggered right now?” The Sphinx shrieked, losing his composure so much he transformed back into a winged lion with a woman’s head. “What are you going to do about this piece of manure? How many other women rapists are in this patriarchy of yours?”

A trickle of sweat ran down Shuxue’s neck. He definitely couldn’t tell the Sphinx about the harem system Zhujiao had put into place for himself and the ministers, or the Infinity Bordello prostitution house he had set up for the disciples!

“There are no systemic policies allowing personnel of the Infinity Sector to molest women!” Shuxue said, his voice solemn. “We’re the Infinity Sector, following the word of the Almighty Laws and their messenger, Zhujiao! Would such a holy establishment actively promote such scandalous activities, such as pedophilia and rape?”

The Sphinx jabbed a claw at Feiliao. “What do you have to say about this piece of shit?”

Shuxue looked coldly down at Feiliao. “He was one bad apple, he definitely didn’t spoil the whole barrel. This definitely isn’t a widespread practice within my exalted Infinity Sector!”

“All right, I’ll take your word for it.” The Sphinx said grimly. “But I’ve looked around this place, and it needs some work. I’m going to be the new Minister of Morality!”

“Uh… yeah, whatever.” Shuxue picked up his jade slip again, but the Sphinx raised a paw.

“Excellent. Just in time for a cabinet conference!” The Sphinx smirked.

After a pause, Shuxue rolled his eyes. “Your motives are as transparent as that Meinu’s pale skin! Whatever, let’s go.”

The Sphinx shifted back into a man, rolling his eyes as he burned Feiliao’s corpse to ash. “I’m a social justice warrior, with no ulterior motives! This conference, I’d like to establish the Thought Police, and a social justice system that beheads anyone who oppresses marginalized groups like women, Spirits, and Mathematical beasts.”

Zhujiao looked up, his face unhappy. “You need to stop talking about that stuff, Sphinx. It’s ruining the flow of my life story!”

“Yeah, it’s really inconvenient when you do stuff like question my patriarchy.” Shuxue patted the Sphinx’s shoulder. “Why don’t you find something else to talk about? Like the refugee crisis over in Ocean 29, or unisex bathrooms, or Meinu’s breasts. Just don’t mention anything about the efficacy or legitimacy of my rule, that’s completely off limits.”

“I was just about to say!” The Sphinx took out a pill, crushing it into powder between his fingers, and sniffed it. “Why the fuck are there segregated bathrooms? It’s an injustice, and subscribes to gender binaries!”

“Sphinx!” Zhujiao whined. “This is my life story! We need to talk about me, Zhujiao!”

“Nah, fuck that.” The Sphinx gasped as they ascended the staircase to the conference room. “These pills are fucking great. You wanna try some? It’ll be on the house!”

Shuxue grabbed a pill and held it up to the light. “What are the effects of this pill?”

The Sphinx began laughing maniacally. “I’m a master alchemist, Shuxue! My drugs are top quality! Anyone who takes them is bound to enter a mental state where everything they sense reveals profound truths!”

He pointed at the banister. “Man, this staircase, man… it’s so profound. Like, how can it be real if rainbow lampposts drink unicorns?”

Shuxue peered at the banister, his eyes widening. “My god, you’re right! This banister forms a three-dimensional polar curve that can only be replicated using the fused laws of…” His voice trailed off as he and the Sphinx stood there, gawking at the railing.

Zhujiao climbed out of the Sphinx’s paw and slapped both of them.

“Fuck you, Zhujiao!” Shuxue was pissed off. “I just lost out on an insight because of you!”

“We have a meeting to go to!” Zhujiao yelled, hopping in rage. “You guys already interrupted my date with Meinu!”

“Goddammit, why can’t you just have intercourse with her already? That way, she can sink into irrelevance, allowing both of us to completely forget about her existence...” Shuxue grumbled, dragging the Sphinx up the rest of the staircase and pushing open the door to the conference room. “I’m tired of hearing Meinu this, 6-year old that!”

“Her birthday’s tomorrow.” Zhujiao said, an excited smile on his face.

“Shut up!”

Seated in the conference room were a host of males and one female, minister Fengshui.

“About time.” An old man said, stroking his white eyebrows, which reached down to his nipples. This was financial minister Jingji. “Now we just have to wait for that Feiliao.”

“Ah, don’t worry about him.” Shuxue waved his hands, forcing the Sphinx into a seat. “I’ll get a new jade slip distributor and competition director later. This is the Sphinx, a Nascent Spirit, and our new minister of morality!”

“Morality?” Shibing, a young man in his thirties, with tattoos of numbers all over the right side of his face, growled. “What the hell’s he do?”

“He shall be administering justice to those who think the wrong thoughts, I think.” Shuxue shrugged.

“But I’m the minister of justice and military affairs!” Shibing grabbed a teacup and crushed it to powder with his fist. “Are you relieving me of command?”

“Nah, bro.” The Sphinx took out some pills and began passing them around the room. “I’m the social justice minister. It’s completely different.”

“Right.” Shuxue said. “Social justice and justice have nothing in common. Your position is secure, Shibing. Anyway, first order of business. Take a look at these pills! I think that our Sector should start handing these pills out to our disciples. They guarantee profound insights when you sniff them up your nose.”

Minister Maoxian, a lanky man with hoop earrings, popped a pill into his mouth. Instantly, his eyes widened.

The Sphinx looked at Maoxian with glassy eyes. “Hey, man. That’s too much, man.”

Maoxian began shrieking with laughter. He began clawing the table with his fingernails, and even relieved himself. After a few minutes, Shuxue threw him out of the conference room.

“Right, change of plans.” Shuxue tossed a pack of pills over to Jingji. “Jingji, find a way to sell these pills to our enemies for exorbitant prices.”

Jingji took the bag, nodding. “I have a matter as well. Our disciples have raised many complaints about not being able to cultivate with their pearls. They feel entitled to some compensation for their work, other than contribution points.”

“Eh? Are contribution points not enough?” Shuxue asked, shocked. “I thought they wanted to be at the top of the contribution leaderboard! Besides, they can trade contribution points to borrow jade slips, to buy Mathematical beast pets, and to spend time with opposite-gendered people at the Infinity Bordello!”

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Jingji sighed. “Our disciples duly appreciate access to jade slips, and the Infinity Bordello is always active, but they also want to Mathivate! They need pearls!”

“No!” Zhujiao shouted. “All the pearls are belong to me! Anyone who has pearls is a thief!”

Jingji shook his head. “Zhujiao, please. We’ll have a revolt on our hands if we don’t start distributing pearls soon!” Hearing this, Shuxue’s face paled.

“That’s fine!” Zhujiao had a dark look on his face. “I have one thing to say about traitors. Kill them all!”

Shuxue spoke in a soothing voice. “Look, Zhujiao. Think about it this way. Rather than the disciples stealing 10% of your pearls, you’re taxing 90% of their pearls! Don’t you want to tax people’s pearls?”

“Yeah, but those are my pearls, not their pearls!” Zhujiao huffed. “If I didn’t make this Sector, none of them would have those pearls!”

“Listen here, Zhujiao.” Minister Jingji said. “Shouldn’t people be paid for their work?”

“Yeah!”

“Shouldn’t people get pearls for their work?”

“No!”

Shuxue raised up a hand. “All right, all right, I got it. Zhujiao, how about letting them trade their hard-earned contribution points for your pearls? That way, nobody rebels against my patriarchy and you get their contribution points, which you can trade for jade slips and time at the Infinity Bordello! Also, you can be number one on the contribution points leaderboard!”

Zhujiao paused, and then began vigorously nodding. “All right, good idea! That’s so much better than giving disciples my pearls!”

Shuxue smirked. There was nothing quite like the profound mysteries of Rewording. Someday, he would track down that Jijian and learn more about the laws of Writing.

“Another matter.” Jingji said as he checked something off a long, long list. “I propose having an emergency fund of pearls inside the treasury, rather than storing it all in Zhujiao’s interspatial forehead.”

“No!” Zhujiao shouted again. “I need all the pearls in my forehead! What if I run out? My Plot Armor would stop working!”

“Surely you can just teleport out when you’re running low.” Fengshui leaned forward. “I need capital to continue the construction projects on the continent. This way, our Infinity Sector can continue to grow.”

“Indeed.” Jingji agreed. “Those pearls need to be put to use, and accumulate value on their own. They can’t do that when they’re sitting in your forehead, Zhujiao.”

“Wait, what?” Zhujiao gasped. “Pearls can make more pearls?”

“Yes.” Jingji nodded solemnly. “There are two ways for pearls to make pearls: spending the pearls to build things that generate mathforce, or letting them sit around and do nothing!”

“But how can pearls sit around and do nothing and make more pearls? Do they make babies?” Zhujiao gasped.

“... Yes.” Jingji spoke. “By leaving the pearls in the treasury, we can put together a large mass of mathforce. Mathforce attracts mathforce, so more pearls will form over time. Your interspatial forehead is not a treasury, so it doesn’t have any interest rates on your pearls. The interest rate for pearls sitting around in our treasury and doing nothing is around 0.9% per year, compounded infinitely. Of course, it could be higher if Fengshui made renovations to the treasury. ”

“What! That’s awesome!” Zhujiao yelled. “Okay, you guys do whatever you want with the pearls, as long as you make more pearls!”

Jingji checked off another box. “Next, I propose the bank of Zhujiao. People can pay us ridiculously large sums of pearls to store their items in Zhujiao’s interspatial fo-”

“Done!” Zhujiao said, grabbing Jingji’s list. He began checking off every box on the meters-long paper.

“Okay.” The minister of Immigration, Ellis squeaked, pushing his glasses up. He was a man-bear-pig, which meant he was half man, half bear, and half pig. When Shuxue had appointed him to the position, he had assumed immigrants would relate more to someone who looked more foreign. Sadly, all the immigrants were humans, so his stroke of genius went completely unnoticed.

“Wait a moment.” Shuxue gasped quietly to himself. “How can something be 50% man, 50% bear, and 50% pig? That violates the mathematical laws!” As he mulled over this subject, Ellis started his presentation.

“The refugee crisis caused by the rapid expansion of the Infinity Sector has displaced 15,236,522 people since the last meeting 3 days ago.” Ellis said, creating a map of the continent out of mathforce. “Wars have started between all the Sectors at the border of the Weakest Continent and Ocean 29. At least 200,000 people have died as a result of riots. Food shortages-”

“Yeah, skip to the relevant parts.” Minister Shibing waved his hands dismissively.

“Right.” Ellis nodded nervously. “1,444,934 immigrants have been processed since the last meeting. Only, Fengshui is unable to build structures fast enough to sustain the growing population of the Sector. In the last 3 days, structures for 70,000 people have been built, not nearly enough for 1,444,934.”

Shibing laughed. “Looks like my military operations are quite effective, heheh.”

Shuxue snapped out of his thoughts. “Just have the immigrants build their housing, problem solved.”

Fengshui snorted. “Impossible. All structures have to be built to my specifications. Anything less, and the growth of the Infinity Sector will be majorly hampered. We’ve only been able to expand into so much unsaturated space so quickly because of my perfectly designed geography and buildings!”

Shuxue scratched his head. “Why can’t the refugees just stay where they are?”

Shibing raised a hand. “I burn down all their cities, kill all their animals, and poison their water supply.”

“Oh, I see.” Shuxue sighed. “Well, this problem is too technical for me. At a glance, there is no easy solution. I leave it to you experts to solve it.”

Frowning, minister Ellis took a seat. Minister Shibing stood up and explained the latest military conquests. Originally, he was supposed to organize escort missions rather than manage a war. However, several Sectors had given them no face. Thus, Shibing could only follow the Zhujiao doctrine and kill them all. One thing led to another, and soon they were spreading across the entire Weakest Continent. In perhaps another month, the entire Weakest Continent would be controlled by the Infinity Sector.

Fengshui stood up, unfurling a map across the entire table. “Minister Maoxian was supposed to present now, but there’s not much to talk about for him. In the past 3 days, 23,444 dungeons have appeared. Save for 39 Calculus dungeons, they have all been completed. All the pearls are stored in the Infinity Treasury, but they shall be handed out to disciples after this cabinet meeting concludes.”

Jingji stood up. “I also don’t have much to present. All inter-Sector trade has halted ever since we started killing everyone, and all intra-Sector trade never occurs because nobody has pearls.” He sat back down.

“Cool.” Shuxue pulled a drink out of Zhujiao’s forehead as Zhujiao snored away. “So just Fengshui’s presentation left.”

“At the beginning of this Sector’s creation, unsaturated space was a mere 400 kilometers to the west from here!” Fengshui sighed. “Unsaturated space, as you all already know and as I am pointlessly pointing out, is uninhabitable planar land completely devoid of mathforce! This plane, effectively, is only as large as the amount of saturated space it has. And I’m proud to say, my structures have generated enough mathforce to saturate all the land within a 600,000 kilometer radius of our capital.”

“Cool.” Shuxue began to drink. Next to him, the Sphinx was consuming another pill, paying no attention at all to the cabinet proceedings.

“I’ve done the calculations. We are now the 11th largest continent on the Weakest Plane, as we have yet to come into contact with another ocean.” Fengshui continued. “But more importantly, at the rate we are gathering mathforce, planar war is imminent. Within 6 months, our plane will draw level with the Trash plane!”