by <unknown>
The four of them were so anxious that their hearts nearly skipped a beat, while they were too concentrated to ignore the feeblest sound inside the smoke.
1 minute and 43 seconds later, something clicked in a corner of the darkness.
Then, all the sounds in the smoke suddenly stopped. The only thing left was Leng Ziming's heavy breathing.
As for Li Yao, he seemed to have become a ghost who had melted into the smoke. There was no way to sense his existence at all.
Leng Ziming spoke, somewhat hoarsely, in the darkness.
"You can't be faster than me.
"The two gold pistols modified by me each have 327 components. 272 of them are fundamental for the pistol to be triggered. The other components are to enlarge the shooting range and to ensure the stability.
"I have assembled 265 components, with only 7 to go. There's no way you could have been faster than me!
"More importantly, I've picked up all the bullets of the pistols in my hand, which is also why I was 5.4 seconds slower than you during the collection of components. There are no bullets in your pistol. What can you do even if you are pressing it against my head?"
There was a brief silence in the smoke, which was broken by Li Yao's calm voice.
"Firstly, the two pistols of yours are 'Tsunami VII' developed seventeen years ago by 'Blowing Wind Hall'. The model has a long shooting range, an impressive power system, and an ultra-solid structure. It also entails the possibility for the user to carve various rune arrays for the purpose of modification. It is indeed a piece of classic gun magical equipment, which you have upgraded with 27 special components of your own.
"However, this gun model does not require 272 components to be triggered. In the extreme conditions, 231 components will be enough.
"Of course, under such circumstances, the pistol has no precision whatsoever. Its effective shooting range may be well below 20 meters. Due to lack of rune arrays, its inner structure is not stable, which could potentially lead to explosion in the bore.
"But since I'm pressing the gun against your head, precision and shooting range are highly unimportant. So, I simply ignored all the components in these regards.
"Secondly, you did take away all the bullets of the pistols. That why I had changed the barrel of the pistol in my hand into the barrel of a storm bolter, which allowed me to use bullets for storm bolters. At such a short distance, I can blow apart your head easily even if you are at the Building Foundation Stage."
Leng Ziming's voice indicated that he was not convinced.
"Although Tsunami VII is a heavy pistol model, its components are not appropriate for the barrel of storm bolters. If you are using the bullets of storm bolters, the odds of an explosion in the bore are at least fifty percent!"
Li Yao's voice remained tranquil.
"Not fifty percent, but eighty percent. To be precisely, there is an 84% likelihood that after I pull off the trigger, the overloading spiritual energy will raise an explosion immediately due to lack of stabilization rune arrays.
"But I'm very confident in my modification. The bullet will be shot out before the explosion!
"For a Building Foundation Stage Cultivator such as myself, an explosion in the bore would possibly seriously damage my hand. But with timely treatment, it is very likely that it can be recovered to normal.
"In the worst-case scenario, I can put on artificial limb if my entire hand is blown to pieces.
"But if your head is blown to pieces, you can't come back to life even if we install a crystal processor into your brain.
"Therefore, in my opinion, a risk of my hand being detonated in exchange for a certainty of a headshot is a good bargain."
Hong Tong activated the ventilating system of the room. The black smoke was soon extracted.
In a corner of the room, Leng Ziming was holding a gold pistol in his hand which was sparkling and ready to be completed. Yet, there was nothing he could do, because a thick barrel was pressed against one of his temples.
Behind the thick barrel was a messy eye-sore that could not be called a gun at all.
But no one doubted that fatal bullets could be shot out from the thing.
"Captain."
Leng Ziming's eyeball were rolling, while he managed to put on a smile. "I think that Mr. Li Yao is more than qualified to join Team Blue Bronze. With him as our teammate, we will never run out of magical equipment on the battleground. I have a feeling that he could produce a piece of deadly magical equipment even if he were given nothing but a frying pan."
"Indeed."
Li Yao nodded his head and slowly pulled the gun that he had cobbled together away from Leng Ziming's head. Then he continued. "I've devised certain crystal bombs which use frying pans and cooking pots as disguises. They are perfect indoor traps."
Hong Tong and his other three teammates looked at each other.
Yan Yangtian whistled. Ba Weiqi grinned. Everyone was beaming with delight.
"Welcome to Team Blue Bronze!"
Hong Tong laughed in satisfaction and hugged Li Yao.
Then, they went through the standard procedures.
Li Yao and Team Blue Bronze signed a contract. He received a lot of personal combat videos of his teammates. In return, he offered his detailed files, including the abilities that he was good at.
In the Occult Orbs, tacit cooperation between teammates was always of paramount importance.
"Adept at ancient rune arrays…"
"Adept at the identification of ancient spiritual beasts and exotic treasures…"
"Adept at ancient puppets…"
"Adept at the identification and repair of ancient magical equipment…"
"Adept at the identification and usage of Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures…"
Reading all this, Hong Tong couldn't have been more excited. He exclaimed, "Excellent. If you are indeed an expert in the identification of Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures and the study of ancient magical equipment, we may be able to try our luck in the 'secret treasure exchange'!"
Li Yao raised his eyebrow.
"Secret treasure exchange?"
He had heard the name before in the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion of Serpent City. It was supposed to be a trade fair for defective or unknown materials.
At that time, the manager of the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion also told him that the trade fair there was not even close to the largest of the federation.
The largest secret treasure exchange was always held in Killua City on the Grand Desolate Plateau.
Hong Tong smiled.
"As a refiner, you have probably heard of secret treasure exchanges before. Maybe you even joined some of them in person.
"However, even the secret treasure exchange in Killua City is boring. They're only trading things that we're not interested in.
"The secret treasures that they deem precious were mostly excavated from the Occult Orbs by us. Of course, we get to choose what we want first.
"A large-scale secret treasure exchange will be held every month in Empyreal Star City. The Orb Patrollers will be given a big discount if they want to buy any of them. Only those secret treasures which we leave behind are given to the outside world.
"In the past, there was no expert at identifying Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures in Team Blue Bronze. Therefore, we hardly took part in the secret treasure exchanges. Even if we did, our purpose was mainly for fun.
"Right now, we've got an expert in our team. We're definitely going to purchase something big!"
While Hong Tong was talking, he led Li Yao to a meeting room.
In the center of the meeting room was a fixed crystal processor which was connected to the mainframe crystal processor of Empyreal Star City in the minimum level, allowing it to retrieve information whose confidentiality level was not high.
"Shua!"
An astounding scene unfolded itself in the light beam.
In the depths of the deep, dark, desolate sea of stars, a nebul
a was swirling slowly.
What was weird was that in the center of the nebula, there seemed to be a gigantic eye which was blinking and unleashing soul-stirring disturbance through the light beam.
In the center of the eye was a grey planet.
Although it was just a few seconds, Li Yao had the feeling that someone was peeping at him. His heart was racing, and he felt a strong killing intent.
Hong Tong explained, "This is an Occult Orb more than nine thousand lightyears away from the Heaven's Origin Sector which was discovered by a 'Phantom Traveler'."
The Phantom Traveler was a kind of special magical equipment that represented the peak of the probe technologies of the Heaven's Origin Sector. It could send back everything that it saw back to Heaven's Origin Sector momentarily.
Over the past hundred years, the astronomic technology of the Star Glory Federation had developed exponentially. Countless Phantom Travelers had been sent in every direction to explore the endless sea of stars.
The cost to launch a Phantom Traveler was one tenth of that to launch a star shuttle. They could be sent to more distant places than the star shuttles could, too.
Therefore, Phantom Travelers inevitably became the vanguard of exploration of Occult Orbs.
Only after a Phantom Traveler detected the existence of an Occult Orb and determined that it was of acceptable value would star shuttles carrying Orb Patrollers be deployed for further research.
"This is the farthest, largest Occult Orb that the Star Glory Federation had ever seen. It is also the one with the most intensive spiritual waves. According to the estimation of the experts, it could be a key battleground in the renaissance war of human beings 10,000 years ago, or an important military base of the Star Ocean Imperium, or an extremely rarely-seen natural paradise for Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures.
"The experts have asserted that this particular Occult Orb is hundreds of times more valuable than any of the Occult Orbs we've discovered so far. It may be the key to the great war between the Heaven's Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector!"
Chapter 368: Heaven's Artillery |
Hong Tong stared at Li Yao in the eyes and said solemnly, "The Star Glory Federation has been exploring the Occult Orbs for hundreds of years. The Occult Orbs several thousand lightyears away from us are mostly discovered already. There are some Occult Orbs that we haven't set foot in, but their size is far from that of 'Ultimacy', nor are their spiritual waves as intensive as those from 'Ultimacy'.
"Right, Occult Orbs Fellowship has named this particular Occult Orb 'Ultimacy'.
"Beyond ten thousand lightyears, there might be even bigger Occult Orbs, or even other worlds which have their own civilization. But reaching them exceeds our technology level at present. Without new magical equipment or knowledge, and just based on the natural development of our civilization, we won't be able to explore and exploit them within the next fifty years even if we are lucky enough to discover any.
"But in the next fifty years, maybe thirty, the Heaven's Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector will meld into one.
"Which means 'Ultimacy' is our last hope for the war between the two Sectors!"
"By the experts' calculation, since it is emitting such strong spiritual waves after thousands of years, Ultimacy must have several pieces of planetary magical equipment or something of the same level, if not stellar magical equipment."
The power of stellar magical equipment could reach every corner in a stellar system.
Planetary magical equipment was relatively weaker, but it could still suppress a planet easily.
Neither the Star Glory Federation nor any of the kingdoms in the Blood Demon Sector were beyond the limitation of the ground. The foundation of the two civilizations was the Heaven's Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector respectively. They hadn't really been able to drift into the sea of stars.
A piece of 'planetary magical equipment' which could suppress a planet easily was indeed a game-changer for the situation. There was even the possibility of waging a genocidal war without taking any casualties.
But if their opponents got the planetary magical equipment first…
Li Yao tremored. He blurted out, "The Blood Demon Sector has found Ultimacy, too.
Not a question, but a statement.
Had the Blood Demon Sector not found Ultimacy, the news wouldn't have been set to the public and it wouldn't have been possible for a random Star Team to get access to the files so easily.
Hong Tong nodded his head.
"In fact, the Blood Demon Sector discovered Ultimacy earlier than we did. It was by stalking an 'Octa-eyed Goblin' of the Blood Demon Sector that one of our Phantom Travelers located Ultimacy."
The Blood Demon Sector had plans to explore the Occult Orbs, too.
Although they didn't have powerful magical equipment, they had bred a special type of demon beast named 'Octa-eyed Goblin' which was particularly suitable for survival and flight in the vacuum of the cosmos. When necessary, they could enter the state of hibernation and flow in the universe for hundreds of years like an asteroid, until it was woken up by any spiritual waves it encountered and continued their journey in the exploration of the universe.
Octa-eyed Goblins and Phantom Travelers were the pioneers of the demon clan and the human beings in the conquest of the sea of stars.
Hong Tong added, "However, the Phantom Traveler didn't find any trace that the demon clan was exploiting Ultimacy on a large scale. It has been assumed that they made their discovery not very long ago. Since the comprehensive capability of the Blood Demon Sector is of similar level to ours, such an Occult Orb that we find difficult to deal with must be tricky for them, too."
Pondering for a moment, Li Yao basically understood the situation now.
"The concept of time in an astronomic sense is always calculated in the unit of billions of years. From that point of view, the two worlds will meld into one like two bubbles in no time. But for us trivial human beings, which are but plankton in the sea of stars, the process can be as long as fifty years.
"During the fifty years, neither of the two worlds will be capable of projecting all the available troops into the other world at their will.
"Besides, even if the projection succeeds and a bloody war is carried out, the most likely outcome is that the two parties will suffer equally great losses. Most of the elites of the two worlds will perish. It is hard to say whether or not the final winner will be able to recover from the war."
In Li Yao's previous life, there was an idea known as 'nuclear winter'. When two countries both with nuclear weapons were at war, it was quite likely that the world would end up in dozens of years of darkness and coldness. There would be no winner. It would be just that some people died later than other people did.
Although nuclear weapons were not invented by the Heaven's Origin Sector or the Blood Demon Sector, the Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators and the demon emperors were capable enough of overturning the world with absolutely no help, just themselves.
In a war where dozens of Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators and demon emperors were engaged, it was not unlikely that the natural spiritual energy of the two worlds would be in disorder, which might cause all kinds of extreme phenomena, including earthquakes, hurricanes, drought, flood, volcano eruption, and maybe even another Ice Age.
Neither humans nor demons would like to see that happen.
So, it would be a perfect solution if some planetary magical equipment which could deal irrecoverable damage to the opponent within a moment could be retrieved from the Occult Orbs.
No wonder Occult Orbs Fellowship was keeping such a high profile recently. Not only had it been revealing a lot of secrets to the public in order to get their support, it was also recruiting talents crazily among Cultivators. Almost all the excellent Cultivators in the Building Foundation Stage had been gathered.
Exploration in the Occult Orbs could indeed potentially decide the destiny of the human beings in the Heaven's Origin S
ector.
Li Yao asked, "Has any Star Team explored Ultimacy?"
Hong Tong shook his head.
"It's still too early. Ultimacy is too far from the Heaven's Origin Sector. To cover the nine thousand lightyears in between, our launch bases can only send out Phantom Travelers. It is impossible to launch star shuttles which are larger in size while ensuring that the crew on board are alive and that the vehicle can return."
Phantom Travelers were smaller, lighter, and relatively simpler in structure. Therefore, it was easier to launch them. They could be boosted with the maximum amount of spiritual energy possible, and it didn't matter very much even if a launch failed.
But it was a whole different thing to launch a manned star shuttle through the four-dimensional space to nine thousand lightyears away instantly.
In an awful tragedy where the star shuttle was successfully sent and yet the Orb Patrollers inside were all killed during the process, it would not help the situation at all.
Hong Tong continued, "Occult Orbs Fellowship has two launch bases and twelve launch platforms. But even the biggest one can only guarantee that the vehicle can be safely recovered within 5,700 lightyears.
"When Ultimacy was discovered, Occult Orbs Fellowship immediately contacted the leaders of the federation as well as the influential Cultivators, who reached a consensus very quickly that all the resources available in the Heaven's Origin Sector would be immediately allocated to build the newest, largest, super teleportation array which would boast the longest launching range.
"We've named the teleportation array… Heaven's Artillery!
"Only with the help of the Heaven's Artillery can we rip open the boundary between the three-dimensional space and the four-dimensional space and land on Ultimacy.
"However, even the Heaven's Artillery cannot teleport many people at the same time. Those to be teleported can't be in the very high levels, either. I believe you've heard of the metaphor regarding the difference between a pebble and a rock before."
Li Yao nodded his head.
Core Formation and Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators were giant rocks tons of weight.