Chapter Ninety-Nine: The Unknown Enemy

Never underestimate the resolve of an empire crawling out from the mire of misery to seek vengeance—especially when that empire, spurred by the iron-willed determination of its ruling elite, decides to charge headlong into industrialization, unleashing the terrifying power of an entire nation fueled by hatred.

The Xinghan Empire was precisely such a vengeful beast, sounding the clarion call of war.

Artificial God Realm 1909.

According to historical records:

Master Lan Yi descended upon the world and swept away the centuries-long, corrupt, and barbaric rule over the Divine Land. This conservative clique, which had seized power illegitimately, institutionalized literary inquisitions, and suppressed progressive thought, was cast into the dustbin of history alongside their lackeys. In their place arose a military aristocratic group brimming with vitality and ambition.

That same year, Master Lan Yi, leading a thousand elite soldiers, set sail on white ships to launch an expedition against the Eastern Sun, punishing the rebellious subjects, extinguishing their statehood, and severing their roots. From then on, the Eastern Sun ceased to exist, replaced by the Atonement Province of the Xinghan Empire.

Having fulfilled his duty, Master Lan Yi returned to the Upper Realm, leaving behind the prophecy that he would one day descend again to endure further tribulations. Soon after, the Imperial Rain Master also ascended into the clouds, and from that point on, there were no more true immortals in the world.

The story of gods had ended; the story of mortals had only just begun.

The immense inertia of history would not be altered by the upheaval in the Far East.

Over the next decade:

The Empire, having risen from the mire of suffering and rebuilt its confidence and strength, completed its primary industrialization through the primitive accumulation of capital from the Eastern Sun and the Nanyang region. This was achieved with the help of domestic talent, overseas Han compatriots, imported experts, the Star Slaves of the Immortals, and texts left behind by Master Lan Yi, such as the *Daoist Classics*. Notably, their power generation capacity skyrocketed, making them the global leader.

During these ten years:

The Xinghan Empire, having managed the Nanyang region, expanded its sphere of influence to its limits. Frequent friction occurred between the Martial Fleet and the Paladin Fleet near the Great Food Sea.

At this time, Zhao Jian, the Fierce Heavenly General and helmsman of the Xinghan Empire, posed a question at the annual meeting:

"Xinghan is too poor."

Repeated war indemnities to the Great Powers had caused massive outflows of silver and gold. The pricing power once dictated by gold and silver was now controlled by foreign capital. To reclaim this pricing power, a burning expedition was required to take back everything they had lost, doubled! This proposal received nationwide approval and aligned with the vengeful sentiment championed by the Jixia Academy.

1914.

After years of management, recuperation, and military preparation:

Eighty thousand armored chariots, a billion human-form martial artists, and thirty-six Dharma-form martial artists!

This force of national annihilation set out in a grand, overwhelming tide for Malacca!

A decade of spiritual energy resurgence had passed.

The various Great Powers, through inhumane experimentation, espionage, and the buying off of traitors, had also grasped a certain degree of extraordinary power and conducted research into innate energy and Daoist arts.

However, the only Great Power that had deeply understood Xinghan culture had already become the Atonement Province. Facing martial arts classics and Daoist materials encrypted with Tang poetry and Song lyrics, they were truly overwhelmed. They had no choice but to pool the strength of all the Great Powers to form a joint fleet in an attempt to block them.

No one expected this to become a world war.

In this conflict:

Artillery and aircraft were rendered obsolete.

They were replaced by the rise of Daoist-armored ironclads and large-caliber individual weapons. Battleships were also phased out, replaced by massive maritime combat platforms dubbed "Earth-Fiend Fortresses"—colossal bosses better suited for carrying martial artists into battle.

The flames of war burned from the Tianzhu Sea all the way to the Mediterranean.

The Great Powers' empires were shattered.

Facing a vengeful army that held the advantage in martial arts and mastered field-controlling Daoist techniques, they wiped out an entire generation of the Great Powers' youth on land and sea. In the heat of the carnage, even many human-form martial artists fell amidst earth-shattering explosions and ambush traps!

The Allied forces of the Great Powers were left incapacitated.

They bled the last drop of the Sindhu people’s blood, yet still failed to achieve their strategic goal of choking Xinghan at the Great Food Sea.

The two sides battled fiercely for eight full years.

Finally, a peace treaty was signed in the Red Sea.

With their colonies rotting and their defenses in ruins, the Allied forces were forced to acknowledge the Empire's plan to civilize Yan Continent (Africa). They tasted the humiliation they had once inflicted upon others when they barbarically forced them to sign treaties. Even more ironically, the Great Food people backstabbed the Great Powers and threw themselves into the arms of Xinghan, parroting the rhetoric that they had been "good partners since ancient times."

War is a form of communication.

To be backward is to be beaten, and to be beaten is to run forward—even if the track is not one you are familiar with.

Not even the Xinghan people had anticipated that:

The eight years of violent tug-of-war on the seas and land had created a special group:

Frontline half-breeds.

Their parents had come together for many reasons, only to be separated by the end of the war. Educated by both sides, some of these half-breeds chose to stay in Xinghan, while others left. The martial arts experience and Daoist knowledge they took with them could not shake the foundations of the nation, but it did provide the Great Powers with an initial boost on this new track.

Furthermore:

Several foreigners who had defected after the war, carrying Dharma swords left by Master Lan Yi, committed acts of an extremely grave nature.

This began to plant the seeds of racial theory and destiny theory within the unprecedentedly powerful Xinghan Empire.

A new flame began to ignite and spread within this superpower.

This was not the end of the war.

It was an armistice.

Many realized that in the future, adhering to their Manifest Destiny, Xinghan would inevitably seek to civilize the entire world and purge all barbarians, making another war with the alliance of Great Powers unavoidable.

Another decade of spring breeze blew across the World Island.

The technological development of Artificial God Realm 1909 had become completely distorted.

First, artillery shells—especially large-caliber ones—were discarded, as they were ineffective against martial artists clad in Giant Spirit Power Armor. Human-form martial artists could easily calculate the trajectory of the shells, dodge the impact point, and charge into fortifications to clear the field.

They were replaced by more practical individual directional explosive mines and heavy bolters.

These were far more effective in close-quarters combat.

More powerful explosives were relegated to defensive positions and ambush traps.

Air power was abandoned.

Because air superiority could not dictate the outcome of the battle. Within ten minutes of the start of a fight, martial artists would swarm into the positions like a tide for close-quarters combat. By the later stages of the war, the speed of a Dharma-form martial artist was nearly at the speed of sound; if an aircraft flew too low, it would be swatted down by martial artists leaping into the air.

In contrast, airships—capable of flying higher, carrying more, and offering more comfort—were favored by martial artists.

A few cutting-edge, high-speed fighters became the exclusive assault vehicles for martial artists to "drop from the heavens."

The navy was much the same.

In general, they were actually backward.

But in terms of power generation and transmission, Artificial God Realm 1909 was miles ahead of everyone else!

After the war, thermal power generation was gradually phased out.

It was replaced by radio technology developed by the Invested Daoists based on the Thunder Pool Immortal Lotuses and the Golden Men. This technology was highly mystical in nature; it directly utilized spiritual energy to achieve ionospheric power generation and wireless current transmission!

Since the ionosphere had a massive electrical potential difference relative to the planet's surface, the Invested Daoists used a Golden Man to transmit signals (low-frequency resonance waves) and successfully drew the current down. With the rugged and durable nature of Dharma-form martial artists, who could survive lightning strikes without dying, Xinghan—having obtained the wireless electromagnetic parameters—ushered in a third industrial revolution!

This was epoch-making super-technology and the ultimate treasure left behind by Lan Yi.

Before the geomagnetic field vanished:

The Xinghan Empire possessed infinite energy.

This was the flower of electromagnetic technology from the Artificial God Realm's "Command & Conquer." This flower should have been a crystallization of the technological path, but it was forced into existence by the Xinghan Empire's Invested Daoist arts and martial artists.

Infinite electrical energy.

What did this mean for the Xinghan Empire?

It meant that the super-heavy armored units of the Bureau of Investigation could be built even larger, as massive as mountain fortresses. It meant there were no longer any restrictions on the spiritual food and electrical modifications for martial artists. It meant that the Invested Daoists of the Jixia Academy could squander spiritual energy at will, achieving miracles through sheer force in industrial and agricultural production. It meant they could support even more Dharma-form martial artists! It meant that the "Blood Tax" could be collected more gently—or more ruthlessly!

Just as the Xinghan Empire was celebrating the breakthrough of this technology nationwide, Artificial God Realm 1909 welcomed uninvited guests—guests who were destined to arrive.

Zhao Jian, who had been elected as the leader of the imperial military clique, was urgently summoned back to his office by his secretary.

In the solemn, gold-and-red-temple-like office, thirty-four out of fifty-five high-backed chairs were already lit, each occupied by a blurry, unstable phantom, their formidable presence barely contained.

This was ultra-long-distance imaging technology created by the Invested Daoists of the Jixia Academy using electromagnetic Daoist arts.

"Attackers?"

This Fierce Heavenly General, who had been a butcher fifty years ago and now held the supreme position, felt puzzled after reading the attack report at a glance.

"Where is Geng Liangchen? What woman is he playing with?"

"The Ghost Heavenly General… he may have fallen in battle…" Mo Qianchen, draped in purple-gold Daoist robes and radiating an immortal aura, looked grim.

Xinghan had two Dharma-form experts guarding Tianzhu, and one who cultivated the Heavenly Palace.

The fall of a Dharma-form expert was an unacceptable blow to the Empire.

As soon as Mo Qianchen spoke, the leaders were in an uproar.

Only then did they notice that the chairs of the experts in the Tianzhu region were not lit.

"Who did this? Do those barbarians have that kind of ability?" Zhao Jian refused to believe it, turning to ask the head of the Embroidered Uniform Guard.

"It shouldn't be the 'Ghost Guys' (foreigners). According to information just sent back by the Embroidered Envoys, their fortress groups were also attacked," a handsome, clean-shaven bald man with scars on his head pondered.

"Don't give me that useless talk. We don't even know who the enemy is. Don't you think that’s ridiculous?"

"The enemy appeared suddenly."

It was Nong Jinsun, the Chief Inspector of the Bureau of Investigation, who spoke.

This handsome, elegant, and enlightened figure from fifty years ago was now an Invested Daoist with white hair and a youthful face, full of vigor.

"The Thunder-Heaven-Earth-Movement Instrument shows that one day ago, all the Thunder Pool Immortal Lotuses simultaneously generated two new wavebands. Two suddenly appearing Dharma-form level entities forcibly inserted themselves into the spiritual energy frequency band."

Suddenly appearing?

For a moment, everyone’s eyes flickered, as if they had touched upon a taboo topic, and they fell into a collective silence.

Back in the day.

Master Lan Yi also appeared suddenly, and vanished suddenly.

Could it be that the Master had returned?

"Is there some misunderstanding? Did they start fighting as soon as they met?" someone muttered.

"It’s likely not a misunderstanding," the bald man's voice was distorted, making it uncomfortable to listen to. "The Ghost Heavenly General had dialed an emergency call before he went missing."

"He only managed to say half a sentence."

"That half sentence was: 'The arrivals are not from the Upper Realm, they are...'"

They are what?

At that moment, the image of the bald man was suddenly interrupted.

After the abrupt cut, it flickered back into existence ten seconds later. Even through remote communication, everyone could feel the slight panic emanating from the bald man.

"They are coming for me! There are two martial artists, their strength is terrifying—at least Dharma-form level! I don't know how, but they locked onto me. My adjutant and the military Daoists have already fallen, they...!"

Before he could finish.

The bald man's image was extinguished instantly.

"He doesn't have a fixed garrison zone; he should be patrolling the high-altitude snowy regions now," Zhao Jian realized something and looked at the Map of the Myriad Miles of Rivers and Mountains drawn on the large table in the center of the office.

First Tianzhu—it seemed he had made a tour of the front lines in Islamabad—and then the highlands.

The opponent's goal was very clear.

Two martial artists, coming for the high-level experts.

Regardless of who they were, their actions had violated the core interests of the Xinghan Empire and angered the most powerful biological entities in this world. A great war was inevitable. Moreover, these two people had also taken the time to beat up the Great Powers' alliance. Now, the eyes of all the top experts in the world were truly drawn to them.

And beneath this chaos.

The advance team of one hundred from the Main World had already landed in Yazhou.

Ji Ning's work arrangements were orderly.

Establishing camps, shielding the passage, forging identities, and gathering intelligence.

The most important task was to determine the degree of space-time oscillation and trace the source of the other potential passage.

Ji Ning was very careful.

As an experienced spiritual energy cultivator, knowing that this world had become "martial-ized" and had already initiated a martial arts revolution, he did not interact with spiritual energy the moment he arrived to establish a link with this world. Instead, he used his mind-power and Daoist arts to attempt to obtain small-scale spiritual energy sources from the local ruling powers.

Thanks to the highly developed state of electricity in this world.

Ji Ning and his team easily stole the operation and usage of a small spiritual energy conversion device in the Yazhou prefectural government and deciphered the simple electrical signal program within it.

After doing this.

Ji Ning received one piece of good news and one piece of bad news.

The good news was that this world was indeed a heaven-like world of logistical resources. It even possessed technological reserves like ionospheric power generation, which was equivalent to infinite energy in the short term. The Ancestral Temples and the Jixia Academy had organized and packaged the resources well, and the main river civilization of this world was currently in a lull between wars.

For a reincarnator, this was a super-treasury waiting to be exploited. Even if all the reincarnators of the river civilization came to mine it together, there would be no need to worry about resource depletion.

The bad news was that this world was in a precarious state. It was under invasion, and facing the intrusion of another Artificial God Realm expert, the martial arts masters and Invested Daoists—who had not yet developed their martial arts to the limit—were being beaten into a state of confusion, suffering heavy casualties. Furthermore, fifty years into the spiritual energy resurgence, the backward side, according to the underlying operating logic, would also obtain certain opportunities.

"No, we must find a way to cut off the unknown Artificial God Realm passage."

Ji Ning put down the wiretapped radio communication; he had to do something.