Chapter 1868: with translation of chapter title

NO. 483: I'm on vacation alone.

"So you're here."

"...?"

In the simulated nature-themed protected area of Heaven's Gate City, Aomo Lindun spotted that conspicuous black.

But that conspicuous perception perhaps only showed up on him, after all the people around paid no attention to that sharp, fierce black, as if the opponent's entire armored figure, resembling the size of a humanoid boss model in an action game, was not worth noticing.

Don't pretend to be dark, even though Heaven's Gate City never lacks exotic outfits, nor diverse physiques, the Beast King's attire is still very eye-catching.

The reason everyone didn't see Him is still the discrepancy in the concept of 'existence'; if there is any forgetfulness, one might regard it as insufficient permission in a 'digital world' style, just as ordinary digital beasts cannot perceive the constant existence, but if one can touch higher permission, the view will be vastly different.

Merely as a steady development example of the microscopic world, the 'information volume' of the digital world cannot compare to the real world; this intuitive manifestation shows that real-world life can expand its 'vision' through various cultivation practices, thereby 'seeing': killing intent, energy, weak points, nodes, higher dimensions, incomprehensible things, and so on and so forth.

And the digital world can only see that sort of ghostly, spooky stuff.

At first glance it's merely a weak differentiation due to lacking elements, insufficient tags, and unfree style; but if we view each other in the realm of 'world', the digital world is thoroughly surpassed in its foundational concepts of 'information' and 'data'.

Just as ordinary people have limited information processing via the five senses, yet can compensate for these deficiencies through training, cultivation, and sublimation to stand shoulder‑to‑shoulder with beings called gods, the limit that digital beasts can reach by those same means is unusually cramped—not that their future is blocked, but merely because their superstructure hasn't been built high enough.

The road ahead hasn't been opened and widened yet, so there is no large environment affected by it, nor can we deeply intervene in the existence mode of the entire digital beast populace.

To catch up with the caliber of the real world, they still lack several stages of evolution that could cover the whole race—when the disparity in individual strength can be large enough, this evolution is often guided, directly or indirectly, by the strongest individuals; but obviously, no one with such far‑sighted vision has appeared yet.

The vast majority of digital beasts focus only on the present; even if they have had contact with the human world, they don't consider the high‑end combat power difference a big deal, since ordinary humans are generally weak, and compared to that, the advantage of digital beasts is truly obvious.

Grand ambition can support a serious, comprehensive comparison of the two realms' strengths; after all, to want that world you must study the win rate, and then realize that ninety‑nine percent of digital beasts neither notice nor care about the fact—the digital world is the weaker side.

Upper‑tier and top‑tier combat powers are simply incomparable.

The middle‑lower advantage is based solely on the premise that many humans in the real world neglect combat and cultivation.

Once officially entering a state of war, the humans' abundant opportunities to grow stronger will quickly turn into a massive disadvantage for the digital world side that is hard to chase, at which point the digital beasts' advantage may remain only their ability to swarm troops in specific data environments.

That is certainly not enough.

Aomo Lindun clearly understands this, and also believes that a certain someone in the Hei'an region is equally aware, so he trusts that the opponent's calm before the storm will be much thunder and little rain—the target will not be the whole federation, but limited to certain locations.

Perhaps it will concentrate in a small area, sweeping in with decisive force to seize and disguise it as an ordinary development base—given today's advanced internet, any disguise would be difficult, and even the slightest leak could spread the truth across the whole net; yet digital beasts indeed have a natural advantage in information manipulation, as evidenced by the fact that many net detectives and cyber hackers possess specialized digital beast assistants for the net.

They could also be scattered across the federation, appearing as seemingly unrelated, low‑priority crime cases, while actually lurking and developing like a proliferating G—this is also recorded in the cult's documents that Shingeki Zero has gone through.

Yes, this approach is exactly what the cult is best at.

Considering that most of the high‑ranking members of the Beast Cult have joined the opposing forces, Aomo's line of reasoning naturally leans toward the priests putting their specialties to use……those demon kings in the Hei'an region sheltering them surely aren't just keeping them around idle.

If we really talk about keeping them idle, it must be this person before us, right?

"What happened again?"

The red light in the helmet's eye sockets is hard to read as emotion, the whole solemn killing metal mask makes it impossible to discern expression, and those words don't seem to echo in the ears but rather like a hollow self‑talk rising from the heart,

"Even the tone is the same—couldn't that just be self‑talk?"

"The voice is even deeper and hollow, sounding like an armored NPC speaking in a fragmentary narrative game—couldn't that just be hollow echo?"

"But how to say it? At least the pronunciation is precise and fluent, right?"

Compared to the earlier need to constantly sprinkle ellipses and commas to portray his speech, the Beast King now, although still somewhat anthropomorphic when he speaks, sounds like those very dark, soul‑like game NPCs, carrying a touch of broken, mottled middle‑aged NPC style, yet at least he can express himself fluently; as one who contributed greatly, Aomo feels a somewhat out‑of‑place pride and relief.

Of course it's out of place, after all he didn't come this time with a relaxed, pleasant visit intention, so pleasantries and denying jokes are temporarily set aside.

He got straight to the point: "I've dealt with most of the cult that caused you trouble; shouldn't I be able to get some advance praise?"

"You don't lack combat strength now." the Beast King said firmly.

"So you plan to give me something functional?"

"The rise and fall of the cult has nothing to do with me; you should be clear on that."

"So there's no reward, huh?"

"You have the 'eye' of the Star‑Devouring Wing," the red light in the eye sockets flared, as the Beast King solemnly surveyed Aomo and said calmly, "I can help you get rid of it."

"That's not necessary."

Aomo shrugged.

"This isn't much of a catastrophe for me; the cult and that bunch of digital beasts cause far more trouble."

"Even if they're both extra‑dimensional monsters?" the Beast King asked.

Monsters that exist in hyper‑space or the microscopic world include beings discarded by Earth and some fluctuating life forms; their expertise often lies in polluting the mentality of real‑life organisms, probing the opponent's mind to cause destruction—such monsters mainly appear on the set of *Ultraman Gaia*, and their physical manifestation is actually limited.

But as the Beast King said, this classification can actually encompass digital beasts, Star‑Devourer Ghidorah, and similar entities that exist in both the microscopic and hyper‑space realms, and the way to deal with them should naturally share common ground.

"The cyber world, the digital realm," Aomo sighed, "you throwing in some electronic monsters are stronger than things like Kuimeizade and Anemos, and besides, saying I lack combat strength—how could you possibly complain about having too much of that stuff?"

"It's not some kind of mechanic‑monster arena; rather, there are many permission oddities among digital beasts—either the same permission level or a large enough value, which do you prefer?"

"..."

The Beast King sighed, a card floated up between his raised gauntlets, and he flicked it to Aomo's fingers.

"Your relationship with Jie De seems pretty good."

"Don't be so damp," he said, glancing at the card's face; Aomo, whose face had just shown a hint of surprise, heard this and could barely keep his composure: "How does the mighty Beast King constantly worry about a big‑sized boy—did he smash your wound with a Galaxy Burst, or did the Jie De Proof gang up on you?"

"Just tell me his reaction when the time comes."

The Beast King said that, already intending to leave, but was stopped by the other's single line, "Wait a moment."

"I still have a question I've wanted to ask for a long time."

Scanning the Beast King up and down, Aomo rarely rubbed his chin and said, "You don't care about the cult, so why do you keep running here every few days?"

"It can't just be because of your second brother's invitation, can it?"

The second of the Sui family, that single‑named dragon‑like youth with the character 'Wang', Sui Pian, whom the other has encountered several times, he also knows of. To be honest, even if you don't pay attention, there will be evening melon muttering, and the doctor will send word, making it seem like a serious situation.

Unnecessary, unnecessary.

Aomo clearly knows what kind of slacker the Beast King is; his only interference in this world is limited to himself, and that cheap second brother he recognized through orders, while full of ideas, can at most pick up some vague theoretical confirmation from words, far from enough to stir up anything big.

Rather, Rhodes Island has already been figuring out how to escape the star‑ring collapse gravity, and still caring about such trivial matters is hardly putting the cart before the horse.

"Of course not."

Listen, this answer is also very straightforward.

It's even quite a riddle.

"The reason I come over every few days, you should really understand by now."

(End of chapter)