NOVPUB
Chapter 268: Chapter 265 Report
News from the Imperial Capital came swiftly.
Gu Jinlai was reorganizing his forces and had not yet managed to go to Cold Moon Sect to defend Blue State when a messenger from the Imperial Capital arrived.
This time, it was still Shang Zhenbei from north of Tianhe who came.
His forces now bore the heavy responsibility of ensuring the north-south passage remained clear.
Even though there were a large number of fish demons in Tianhe, putting humans at an inherent disadvantage, the absence of the Demon King Level existence, the Champsosaurus King, meant that the demons could no longer dream of completely blocking the north-south passage.
Furthermore, with Shang Zhenbei patrolling and slaughtering demons, those cultivators who had made some achievements were cautious enough to seize the moment when there were no demons around and cross over.
Shang Zhenbei arrived at Starlight City and began to haggle with Gu Jinlai.
Ultimately...
Gu Jinlai still complied with Shang Zhenbei’s wishes and sold thirty Sword Heavy Cannons to Shang Zhenbei at the price of three pieces of Immortal Essence Gold each.
As for the method of delivery...
Gu Jinlai would inform Shang Zhenbei whenever he could produce thirty Sword Heavy Cannons, and Shang Zhenbei would then notify the local Demon Refining Hall, which would transfer ninety pieces of Immortal Essence Gold through the Heaven and Earth Qiankun Map.
Of course, due to the Sword Heavy Cannons’ enormous size, transporting them back to the Imperial Capital through the Heaven and Earth Qiankun Map would cost too much, so in the end, Shang Zhenbei would have to escort them heavily guarded.
...
"With this transaction, I can obtain ninety pieces of Immortal Essence Gold, and together with the Immortal Essence Gold obtained from Yellow Sky Sect, as well as the gold accumulated lately from Purgatory Sect, Netherworld Sect, and Cold Moon Sect, currently, the shortfall of Immortal Essence Gold needed for creating Cheng Ying Mecha is only about forty pieces," Gu Jinlai calculated and felt his heart stir with excitement.
To create a Cheng Ying Mecha forged from Immortal Essence Gold!
The main reason his Eternal Furnace was operating at surplus power was that he himself couldn’t withstand the force when the Eternal Furnace ran at full capacity.
If he could cast a Cheng Ying Mecha and infuse energy into it with the transmission characteristic, then every move he made would carry the threat of destroying heaven and earth.
During this process, there would be no need to worry about being ’recoiled’ to death by the undiscriminating explosive aftermath.
Moreover, although he hadn’t comprehended the Undying Will like the Saints, when the Cheng Ying Mecha was damaged, he could repair it using Immortal Essence Gold.
By then...
He wouldn’t dare claim to be on equal footing with a Saint. 𝓷ℴ𝓿𝓹𝓾𝒷.𝓬𝓸𝓂
But to achieve the offensive power of a Saint Realm and come close to their defensive capabilities wouldn’t be too far-fetched.
"Forty pieces of Immortal Essence Gold! Even considering the consumption during the creation of the Cheng Ying Mecha, preparing sixty more will be enough!"
He wished the Imperial Family would buy twenty more heavy cannons so he could complete the required amount.
However, after a moment...
He suppressed that thought.
If he really made such a request to the Imperial Family, it would only make them suspect his motives and the cost of the Sword Heavy Cannons.
If the Imperial Family started to lower the price again, the loss would outweigh the gain.
"Cold Moon Sect, Netherworld Sect, and Purgatory Sect have indeed sent some Immortal Essence Gold and claimed it was all they had in their sects, but... clearly, that was an empty promise. The total Immortal Essence Gold these three major sects could scrape together wouldn’t be less than eighty, if not a hundred..."
Gu Jinlai pondered and decided he needed to find a way to willingly make these three major sects hand over all their stored Immortal Essence Gold.
"The battle of Yuntian City, where the Heavenly Master Apprentices operating the Sword Heavy Cannon received ample merit by bombing the demons, made Immortal Essence Gold as valuable as a top-grade Spirit Artifact in the Demon Refining Hall’s exchange list, which is not very cost-effective. However, if I could take all their merits for my own and exchange them, I should be able to accumulate the required forty pieces of Immortal Essence Gold. But..."
In the end, he discarded the idea.
Although the Sword Heavy Cannons were provided by him, those Heavenly Master Apprentices were merely operators.
Such an act, akin to stealing the merits of subordinates, was unacceptable.
The best course of action...
"Cold Moon Sect is currently facing a siege of demons. If I want merit, I can go to Blue State to exterminate demons, and moreover, if I could replicate another great victory like that of Yuntian City, then suggesting the Cold Moon Sect hand over all their stored Immortal Essence Gold to me afterwards, they should have no reason to refuse."
He made a decision in his heart.
Riches and honors are for the taking on the battlefield.
It was that simple.
He looked up toward the south.
After a moment, his expression subtly changed.
In the past few days, he had been preoccupied with welcoming the triumphant return of the soldiers from the battle of Yuntian City and hadn’t paid much attention to the changes in the south’s Qi of fate, but in just these few days...
The pillar of Qi representing the demons’ fate had grown by at least twenty percent.
This situation...
"Has another Demon King been born among the Mu State demons!?"
Gu Jinlai’s expression turned grave.
However, after closely observing the Qi of the demons in the south for a moment, he discerned a slight abnormality.
Although the demons’ Qi was majestic, like dark clouds bearing down on the city, these pillars of Qi weren’t actually moving toward Blue State.
The Qi forces truly invading Blue State were less than half of those within Mu State.
This made Gu Jinlai uneasy.
"Could it be that the Mu State demons did not use their full strength when attacking the Cold Moon Sect, and their goal... was to feign weakness to lure me to the Cold Moon Sect? Once I arrive at the Cold Moon Sect, the Demon Kings within Mu State will strike at the same time, delivering a fatal blow to me!?"
Gu Jinlai’s expression was grave.
His Eternal Furnace had not yet stabilized.
If he was indeed surrounded and attacked by Demon Kings, he wouldn’t even be able to bring down one or two in mutual destruction.
Yet the battlefield in Mu State was related to whether he could quickly gather the last few dozen portions of Immortal Essence Gold he needed...
His face changed for a moment, but Gu Jinlai soon made up his mind.
"Wait! My Eternal Furnace needs another month and a half to stabilize. During this time, I will send someone to thoroughly understand the Cold Moon Sect’s situation. Once the Eternal Furnace is stable, I will decide whether to go there myself based on the situation in Blue State."
Gu Jinlai settled his mind.
Considering that Lingxiao City was more important to him than Starlight City, he did not stay long in Starlight City.
After arranging for Gu Changfeng, Gu Chaoyang, Qi Renwang, Cheng Wanli, and others to take care of the affairs in Starlight City, he led the Demon God Guards back to Lingxiao City.
However, unlike when he left Lingxiao City with just a few thousand Demon God Guards, he returned with a full ten thousand people at his side.
Yes!
After expansion, the number of Demon God Guards had reached ten thousand.
Furthermore, Gu Changfeng and others had specially organized an army similar to the Fighting God Army. This army was selected from among the elite for strength, character, and loyalty, numbering twenty thousand, and served as a reserve force for the Demon God Guards.
Once the Demon God Guards had surplus Demon Blood Essence, they would refine the essence to break through, becoming the next batch of Demon God Warriors.
When Gu Jinlai arrived in Lingxiao City, there was another round of cheers.
Gu Jinlai celebrated with the people for a day, and soon after, he went to the Military Workshop to discuss improvements to the Sword Heavy Cannon and the Mystic Bird Fighting Machine with Zhang Lihuo.
Actual combat is the best way to verify the power of weapons.
Many had gained a wealth of experience in this great battle against the demons.
After these experiences were accumulated, they would further strengthen the Heavy Weapon troops under Gu Jinlai’s command.
...
While Gu Jinlai was consolidating and waiting for the Eternal Furnace to re-stabilize, the Blue Star was also experiencing turbulent changes.
However, the center of this incident was not the Central Earth Kingdom.
It was the Star Shining Federation, located on the other side of the Blue Star.
At that moment, in a high-standard meeting room, a research project leader was requesting funding approval.
In front of him, dozens of people were sitting, including many prominent figures often seen on the Star Shining Federation’s television and websites.
"Time reversal does not comply with the second law of thermodynamics; without introducing a negative flow of entropy from outside, a closed system will not move from disorder to order spontaneously, entropic direction is the direction of time, thus we cannot reverse a system, much less reverse time and space. Therefore, Dr. Harryman, your project has no value."
At that time, a middle-aged man in a suit was challenging the idea.
"I never said I wanted to reverse time and space."
The project leader responded confidently: "What we want to do is simply obtain the information we need from time and space, then use a special method to allow two different time planes to overlap, letting the information of the two time spaces exchange with each other..."
"What supports your theory?" asked the man in the suit.
"Your excellency, Denis."
Harryman spoke solemnly, "The Earth, the Solar System, the Milky Way are all moving at a tremendous speed in the cosmos, with the scales of time and space constantly changing. Within the same space, different times will see different stars reside..."
"I’ve heard this theory before, and this is also the most widely accepted explanation for the mysterious world shrouding the sky dome above us," the man named Denis responded. "What about you, what do you plan to do?"
"As I’ve described in the report I submitted, the plan is divided into three parts. First, we need powerful signal reception equipment to capture accurate locations from the world’s information, and second, we require a super-large particle collider to disturb space-time, which could possibly connect two worlds that originally didn’t belong to the same space-time continuum."
Dr. Harryman’s eyes shone, "I believe that the distance between our two worlds is not far. I even suspect that some people in today’s world have entered that other world by some chance occurrence, but such a situation is extremely accidental and uncontrollable... What we want to do is to turn that accident into certainty, to make the uncontrollable controllable, thereby stepping into that world ahead of everyone, and even to exploit that world."
"I need sufficient proof to support your theory."
"Evidence, I have it! Please turn to page one hundred and twenty-nine!"
Dr. Harryman spoke assertively, "Our most advanced equipment has already made clear the contours of mountains and architectural wonders. Although we can’t observe the entirety of that immense world... some intense phenomena are important for our observation, and according to the data collected, someone has captured the occurrence of two strong radiant phenomena... As for what these radiant phenomena resemble, my materials have made it very clear."
"Small-yield hydrogen bombs?"
Denis looked at the report and his expression changed slightly.
"Exactly."
Dr. Harryman spoke solemnly: "Perhaps, this is a natural phenomenon, but we cannot exclude a possibility... that someone has already stepped ahead of us. If we don’t act quickly, we will be completely surpassed and left behind."
These words caused the others to swiftly discuss among themselves.
Many even made phone calls, reporting upwards and asking for instructions.
During this time, they asked Dr. Harryman some further questions.
After a full half-hour, Denis finally spoke up again, "So, Dr. Harryman, tell me, what do you need?"
"Money, a lot of money."
