Chapter 166
Our Discord Server: https://discord.gg/PazjBDkTmW
Chapter 166: Title
High-tier monsters remain beyond humanity’s current capabilities, yet Ye Linlang refuses to shoulder the burden of eliminating all such threats single-handedly.
How can growth occur without enduring the baptism of war? In hierarchical terms, a tier two primary world fragment stands incomparable to Blue Star’s current Tier One Pinnacle status. Yet the disparity narrows when considering this mere fragment’s incomplete nature – even at tier two primary, its fragmented state inherently limits the danger.
Nine months prior, this world fragment had filled her with apprehension.
Nine months later, she now wields it as a sharpening stone to temper Blue Star’s edge.
As the sanctuary of world consciousness, nourished by the World Tree’s perpetual Spiritual Energy cycles, Blue Star emerges as a prodigy among worlds. Few realms could boast proper Tier One practitioners within nine months of Spiritual Energy’s Awakening – most would still struggle to cultivate even rudimentary powers.
Ye Linlang contemplates her strategic balance. While capable of optimizing Blue Star’s cultivation environment and guiding its ascension, excessive intervention risks stifling natural development. Future inter-world conflicts demand self-reliance – neither humanity nor other Blue Star inhabitants can perpetually depend on her crisis management.
Beyond the extraordinary individuals awakened during the Spiritual Energy resurgence, all ancient practitioners crafted by her hand – complete with fabricated memories and powers – face strict prohibitions against exceeding world-tier limitations. Overextension brings temporary weakness at best; catastrophic breaches incur celestial law retribution.
This restraint serves dual purposes: conserving Fantasy Points (each second of Tier One Pinnacle overreach draining her reserves exponentially), while allowing raw talents to emerge naturally. The charade of "Spiritual Energy’s Awakening" must also persist – summoning demon lords would trivialize the world fragment crisis, shattering carefully constructed illusions.
Her Fantasy Point reserves demand judicious allocation. Compassion cannot justify subsidizing Blue Star’s tribulations. Cosmic balance dictates equivalent exchange – these disasters target Blue Star itself, and Heavenly Law bars direct intervention regardless. Her role remains limited to minimizing losses through carefully curated proxy identities.
If only true divine power were hers to wield! Yet existing deities’ lofty tiers prove ironically inadequate for planetary protection. Her creations, meanwhile, remain bound to their core programming – initial personality parameters immutable.
From her World Tree summit office, Ye Linlang monitors system feeds of avatars battling abyssal creatures worldwide. A soft sigh escapes her lips. At current power expenditure rates, critical injuries will incapacitate all proxies within two hours. "Even automated bodies warrant better maintenance," she murmurs to the indifferent system.
The screen shifts to ancient practitioners – heroes and villains alike – forming unprecedented alliances against the abyssal invasion. Her gaze lingers on feeds from vulnerable nations, human compassion warring with cosmic detachment. True divinity might numb this pain, but her mortal remnants still flinch from slaughterhouse panoramas.
Pre-crisis system simulations foretold this outcome: only major powers might weather the storm unaided. Her contingency measures crumble against chaotic disorganization elsewhere. Preserving 60-70% of global population qualifies as success in these calculations.
The parallel to her previous life stings – few developed nations amidst seas of struggling states. Now, entire regions face depopulation, particularly Africa’s thirty-plus nations among the forty poorest. What protection can totem deities truly offer?
Casualty counters flicker relentlessly on her display, each digit a soul overwhelming afterlife administrations. Post-Awakening rules preserve these spirits as celestial assets – precisely why she established the realm of the dead. Every soul perishing in cataclysm’s wake becomes another thread in Blue Star’s evolving tapestry.
…This time, at least billions of human souls would emerge; even if they were to reincarnate, none could predict their destination. Ye Linlang briefly contemplated this matter before dismissing it entirely—after all, urgency regarding this issue didn’t rest with her.
As she’d anticipated.
During the first week of the monsters’ descent, Blue Star became engulfed in brutal warfare against the abyssal creatures. Numerous nations vanished from existence before their desperate pleas for aid could receive responses.
The five permanent UN members now struggled with their own crises. Beyond issuing hollow declarations, they could offer no substantial aid while battling domestic hordes of monsters.
*
Special Bureau Headquarters, Zhongxia.
Division 1.
Cui Ming studied the finalized directive in his hands. With most ancient practitioners incapacitated from overexertion and monster eradication efforts slowing drastically, regional military districts now received authorization to deploy heavy weaponry when overwhelmed.
The office’s silence shattered by ringing phone tones.
"Speak."
As the caller continued, Cui Ming’s expression blossomed with restrained excitement. "Confirmed? Excellent. I’m en route immediately."
Combat Meeting Room.
Taking his designated seat, Cui Ming focused on the briefing officer’s report: "Director Yan Hua’s enhanced military formations proved remarkably effective during recent field tests. Cultivation-trained soldiers utilizing these arrays have successfully eliminated Tier One monsters…"
Yan Hua—the Special Bureau’s inaugural director—had earned notoriety for his abrasive demeanor. Since Xi Ning’s appointment, he’d devoted himself entirely to refining combat strategies while overseeing critical decisions.
Despite Zhongxia’s controversial nationwide cultivation mandate pressured by the abyssal invasion, progress remained sluggish. Current assessments showed most civilians plateaued at Tier Three cultivation.
Military personnel fared marginally better, their discipline granting average Tier Two capabilities—though quantity couldn’t compensate for quality against endless monster waves. The fusion of world fragments kept escalating casualties, brutally educating this century-unblooded nation about modern warfare’s realities.
The once-promising Jiuzhou barrier now flickered weakly, having failed completely by the third day. Most abyssal creatures already prowled through Huaxia Nine Provinces unchecked.
*
Bear Country’s populace increasingly embraced the dark council’s Dark Magic as firearms proved inadequate. The demon web’s influence expanded proportionally to governmental strain.
In Fusang, limited numbers of Onmyoji and samurai struggled to maintain order. Only Amaterasu’s shrines offered sanctuary, leaving abandoned cities to become monster strongholds. Beyond key urban centers, chaos reigned supreme.
India’s billions found Neh’s reforms tragically insufficient. With two-thirds of the population effectively abandoned, panic metastasized through the subcontinent.
Smaller Asian nations fared worst—scarce populations meant fewer extraordinary individuals, resulting in complete governmental collapse. Desperate refugees increasingly gambled their lives on breaching Zhongxia’s borders, where relative stability made the risk seem worthwhile.
Upon receiving news of the world fragment monster invasion, Zhongxia immediately issued evacuation advisories to its overseas citizens, urging swift repatriation while evacuation channels remained accessible.
Most willing returnees had already arrived home by the time the notices expired. The nation reluctantly left remaining citizens to fend for themselves, lacking resources for further rescue operations.
Two months prior to the invasion, Zhongxia initiated foreign national repatriations, banning temporary residence under tourist or work visas. On invasion eve, full lockdowns sealed borders, ports, and airspace – a defensive strategy mirrored across Blue Star.
Authorities intensified anti-smuggling operations as desperate citizens worldwide attempted cross-border escapes. Europe fared comparatively better through Vatican City’s holy alliance and the established demon web network, while the Kingdom of England’s resurgence bolstered continental cohesion.
America’s super-soldier serum launched commercially two months earlier at $1,800 per dose – a life-saving investment accessible to middle-class citizens despite financial strain. Though disaster profiteering flourished, survival economics dictated harsh realities: the serum required repeated purchases for sustained enhancement, ensuring corporate profits through engineered dependency.
Post-invasion confirmation saw Australia and others accept the Council of Truth’s demon web expansion, prioritizing survival through technological assimilation. While the network carried risks, its protective benefits outweighed theoretical concerns for vulnerable nations.
Three months post-fragmentation, Bear Country initiated tactical nuclear strikes against a rampaging tier seven monster near Zhongxia’s borders. The detonations’ mushroom clouds became grim precursors to global chain reactions of atomic deployments.
Radiation-limited miniaturized warheads became currency for defenseless nations, their landscapes increasingly plagued by tier three to seven predators. Six months brought celestial transformations – the phantom landmass sharpening into clarity overhead, mirroring the catastrophic descent from eight months prior.
Ye Linlang observed the stabilized fragment through narrowed eyes. After half a year containing ninety percent of inter-dimensional threats, she harnessed the power of the Heavenly Path. The celestial body fractured upon Blue Star’s absorption, disintegrating into cosmic particulates beneath her disinterested gaze.
Planetary expansion commenced without warning. Urban infrastructure stretched like taffy – roads elongating, power grids warping, yet miraculously maintaining functionality. Satellite imagery revealed continental plates drifting apart, new landmasses erupting between nations like geological afterthoughts.
The scientific community stood paralyzed before physics-defying reality: Earth quintupled in size while maintaining gravitational constants and atmospheric composition. For Blue Star’s inhabitants, survival priorities shifted from battling monsters to comprehending their transformed world – where familiar horizons now stretched into alien landscapes beneath an unchanged sky.
