Chapter 180: The Big Pit Dug by Cui Chengze

In Cui Chengze's memory, Wu Chang was not a man of religious faith, especially since every time he brought up that only gods could defeat gods, Wu Chang's attitude was tinged with contempt.

Placed in a more extreme religious group, Wu Chang's reaction would have been enough to get him burned at the stake as a blasphemer.

But what he hadn't expected was that Wu Chang, who showed so little respect for the gods, could actually communicate with them.

Could this be reliable?

Cui Chengze said cautiously, "There's one point I need to remind you of. What I'm talking about is a true god, not those who call themselves agents of the gods, or people who claim to be reincarnations of gods."

This wasn't Cui Chengze being overly suspicious. The Gao Mu nationals called it the Cult Museum. In the past hundred years, there had been over a thousand recorded cults with names, and the pope of every single one of those religions claimed to be an agent of the gods, or a reincarnation of a god.

In just over a hundred years, that Mr. g from Europe had gained over a thousand brothers and sisters in Gao Mu country.

If the god Wu Chang spoke of was one of those thousand-plus people, and the so-called ability to communicate with gods was merely some business dealings between them, that would be hard to swallow.

Wu Chang clicked his tongue and said, "Of course it's a true god. The earthly divine kingdom I've seen was built for that very god."

The term "earthly divine kingdom" wasn't something just anyone could utter, nor was it something one kept on the tip of their tongue.

Earlier, when Cui Chengze had asked Wu Chang how he knew about the earthly divine kingdom, Wu Chang claimed he had seen it while learning to fuse the origin of mysticism into the flesh.

Cui Chengze had had an intuition at the time that Wu Chang's so-called "seeing" wasn't seeing it in a book, but seeing the real thing—an actual earthly divine kingdom. Now it seemed that was indeed the case.

If what Wu Chang said was true, then the god he spoke of should be genuine. But to complete the modification Wu Chang described, one most crucial thing was still missing.

Cui Chengze showed a troubled expression and said:

"There's one last problem. Simply knowing the god's name isn't enough to let the earthly divine kingdom lock onto the god. There must be an object tainted with the god's aura as a guide to connect the earthly divine kingdom with the god."

When Ma Jia modified the earthly divine kingdom, he had once taken out a horn token.

The amount of a god's aura contained in the token also determined whether the connection between the god and the earthly divine kingdom was stable. This stability was especially important when multiple gods were fighting over the same earthly divine kingdom.

The more stable the connection, the faster the god's perception of and response to the earthly divine kingdom.

Using an ordinary token merely tainted with a god's aura was like laying a 2G network between the earthly divine kingdom and the god.

Using a token personally bestowed by a god was equivalent to a 3G network. The tokens used by the Xinyuzhou Sect and people like Ma Jia were all at this level.

Originally, the Xinyuzhou Sect had an even more powerful and direct token—the Eye of Lehmann—but it had already been seized by Cui Chengze, and they could only wait for the evil god to descend and take it back personally.

Cui Chengze looked at Wu Chang. If Wu Chang could only produce an ordinary token, then the holy light Wu Chang spoke of would have a natural disadvantage when competing with the other two gods for the power of the earthly divine kingdom.

An object tainted with a god's aura?

Wu Chang pretended to reach into his embrace and took the Sage's Relic Mask out of his portable spatial storage.

"Do you think this will work?"

Cui Chengze took out a purple crystal ball about the size of a ping-pong ball from his embrace. He placed the crystal ball into the earthly divine kingdom ritual, and at the same time erected four twenty-centimeter clay statues around the crystal ball, took out a carving knife, and carved runes all over the statues.

After about ten minutes of preparation, Cui Chengze had set up a simple detection ritual. As long as the crystal ball emitted light—even the faintest fluorescence—it meant this prop was tainted with a god's aura.

If the crystal ball lit up with obvious brilliance, it meant the item possessed a god's blessing, barely on par with what the Xinyuzhou Sect had brought.

If the crystal ball shone as brightly as a lamp, it meant it contained a portion of the god's flesh or will mixed within, and could be regarded as the god's incarnation in the lower realm.

Cui Chengze took the Sage's Relic Mask and gently placed it at the center of the ritual.

The next moment, the cockpit was as if a sun had risen within it. The light was so bright it nearly blinded Cui Chengze.

It took him a full two minutes to recover from the dazzling glare. By the time his vision returned, he saw that the purple crystal ball had already shattered, and the four clay statues surrounding it had turned to flying ash.

Cui Chengze's eyes went wide, his jaw dropping open as if dislocated.

What Wu Chang had handed him had already exceeded the category of being a mere part of a god's body. According to the result of the array test, the divinity contained within this mask was infinitely close to the god itself!

Even if a real god stood within the test ritual, the result would be no more than this.

Recalling Wu Chang's contempt for the notion that mortals could not defeat gods, cold sweat poured down Cui Chengze's forehead.

This kid couldn't have used some evil art to imprison a god inside that mask, could he?

Wu Chang asked at the right moment, "Will it do?"

Cui Chengze swallowed, turned his head stiffly, and said, "If your tone carried even a shred of uncertainty, it would be a disrespect to it."

Wu Chang shrugged his shoulders. It seemed it would work.

"Using it to position the earthly divine kingdom, when the time comes to activate the earthly divine kingdom, can we seize the initiative?"

Cui Chengze said with certainty, "We absolutely can!"

If ordinary tokens were a 2G network, and objects blessed by gods were a 3G network, then the network constructed by the Sage's Relic Mask in Wu Chang's hands was at least 5G. If the method of constructing the earthly divine kingdom was good enough, building a local area network wasn't impossible.

Two evil gods running on 3G networks fighting over an earthly divine kingdom against a guy running on a local area network—the very picture of it was something to look forward to.

Cui Chengze took a deep breath. As the person who had most wanted to destroy the earthly divine kingdom from the very beginning, he now found himself unable to wait for the earthly divine kingdom to appear.

Wanghai City.

Eileen was alone in the inner world of the room, waiting for Wu Chang to return from the other planes.

Before Wu Chang left, he had specifically instructed her not to leave lightly during the time he was away.

Although Eileen, having been promoted to a Power Angel and possessing a god's true body while situated within her own divine kingdom, could not be harmed by anyone throughout the entire Wasteland Realm, she still followed Wu Chang's advice.

After all, it was a request from him. As long as it didn't conflict with her principles, she could fulfill any request of his that wasn't excessive.

Wu Chang had said his time away would be short, but after he left, Eileen felt the time was especially long as she waited.

So long that it gave rise to distracting thoughts in her heart. A public lecture video had been playing on the computer for twenty minutes, her gaze fixed on the screen, yet none of its content had registered.

This situation was extremely abnormal. Previously, when Wu Chang was carrying out missions in Wanghai City, she had also been alone at home, yet this had never happened.

Eileen noticed her own abnormality and began to think. She quickly discovered that the culprit behind all this was an emotion called worry.

In order to stabilize the earthly divine kingdom of Wanghai City, she couldn't enter the instance dungeon with Wu Chang. She was worried about him encountering danger.

Just like the danger when Lei Hu self-destructed in the Midnight Graveyard.

This kind of worry was different from the worries she had felt before.

As a Holy Maiden, she had worried about believers, and she had worried about ordinary people, but that worry stemmed from a god's compassion. She worried about an entire group, and the starting point of that worry was the duty a Holy Maiden should fulfill, and the will instilled by the church.

Worry could make a person anxious and lower their judgment. Having been stripped of all negative emotions by the church, she had never, from her own perspective, truly felt worry for a specific individual.

This emotion was very foreign to her. Just as she was carefully feeling this emotion, Wu Chang's voice suddenly sounded in her ear.

Wu Chang was calling her, and the way he called her seemed to be through the Earthly Divine Kingdom. The instant she accepted Wu Chang's summons, her consciousness pierced through layer upon layer of obstacles and appeared aboard the Star Leap.

But she did not descend directly into the real world; instead, she appeared within Wu Chang's mental world.

In the mental world, Wu Chang appeared in his own form, not as his current incarnation, Li Zaishi.

Eileen studied Wu Chang, noticed he was missing neither arms nor legs, and was uninjured; a smile unconsciously surfaced on her face.

That smile from the heart shone brighter in Wu Chang's eyes than the glowing crystal sphere from earlier.

Eileen said with a smile, "How are things on your side? Have you run into any danger? I was just worrying about you. Seeing you're fine, I feel a lot more at ease."

Facing Eileen's concern, Wu Chang's first reaction was: has this woman watched some weird video and is now following a tutorial to攻略 me?

His second reaction was: damn, she got me!

Wu Chang steadied his mind with sheer willpower and pulled himself out of his wild fantasies. Last time he had already picked out names for boys and girls; this time he had already fast-forwarded to the kid not studying properly, and how he would wriggle out of it being his fault.

He shook his head and said to Eileen, "There's no danger here. I just ran into two acquaintances."

!

Saying so, he gave Eileen a rough rundown of what had happened on the Silent Route.

After listening, Eileen said, "You mean, once the Earthly Divine Kingdom over here opens, I should try to seize as much of the energy inside as possible to help you suppress the two evil gods."

Wu Chang asked with concern, "Would that affect the Earthly Divine Kingdom on your side?"

Eileen shook her head and said, "As long as I seize enough energy, I can condense a projection by your side. My true body remains in the real world, so it won't affect the Earthly Divine Kingdom in reality."

Wu Chang frowned slightly and said, "Although Cui Chengze assured me that our connection to this side gives us a huge advantage, the gods on Lehmann's and Revelation's side are old fellows who have lived who knows how long. Even though your true body is in the Wasteland Realm, you may not necessarily come out on top."

"If it's dangerous, just grab the energy and leave. When you go, destroy the Earthly Divine Kingdom as much as you can. If what they descend with are only incomplete projections, I can figure something out."

Eileen said with a smile, "I will win."

Once the details about seizing the Earthly Divine Kingdom were settled, Eileen vanished from Wu Chang's mental world. Wu Chang's vision blurred, and Eileen's face before him turned into the aged face of Cui Chengze.

That enormous contrast made him unable to help but spit.

Cui Chengze looked at him with a puzzled expression and asked, "Have you finished communicating with that Eternal Purity Light?"

Wu Chang made a "got it" gesture and said, "Everything's been arranged. We just need to wait for the Earthly Divine Kingdom to activate."

As Cui Chengze breathed a sigh of relief, a trace of reverence appeared in his gaze toward Wu Chang.

Originally, in his eyes, Wu Chang was nothing more than a plutocrat with outstanding talent in mysticism—high in status, but not worthy of his respect.

After all, in the eyes of people like them who possessed power, ordinary people, no matter how much authority or wealth they had, were far behind them on the path of exploring the world's most fundamental truths, just like any other ordinary person.

But the ability to communicate with gods carried an entirely different meaning. If placed in ancient times, only the most powerful Daoist Priests or monks on the suzerain state side possessed such formidable power.

The First Mysticism Grandmaster of the Gao Mu royal family would have to bow and kowtow willingly to take him as a master.

The change in Wu Chang's standing in Cui Chengze's heart brought a change in Cui Chengze's attitude. He claimed that the mysticism-origin ritual he had arranged earlier was not perfect enough and that he needed to further optimize it.

As the two were about to part, Cui Chengze did not forget to offer a reminder:

"Be careful of the three fellows following Yin Junhao. They are definitely not from the Mysticism Research Society. Especially that Ma Jia—something feels very off about him. Compared to that werewolf, Ma Jia is the strongest combatant among them."

Leaving the cockpit, Wu Chang returned to the suite on the seventh floor.

Tonight it was Sword Star's turn to keep watch. Sword Star sat cross-legged on the sofa in the seventh-floor hall, his flying sword laid out before him, resting his eyes.

He sensed someone appear, immediately opened his eyes, saw it was Wu Chang, gave a nod of his own accord, and was about to close his eyes again.

Wu Chang, beating Sword Star to closing his eyes, waved him over and said, "Come in here with me for a moment."

Wu Chang brought Sword Star to the study. The two sat facing each other. Sword Star felt a little guilty. Right after boarding the Star Leap, Wu Chang had assigned him and the Negotiation Master a task, and the two had been busy with that matter all this time.

Although the investigation had made progress, it wasn't as smooth as Shadow and Great White Shark had performed that day, so the two had not reported back.

Wu Chang sat in his seat very relaxed and asked, "You're so nervous—do you have something to tell me?"

Sword Star took a deep breath and thought to himself, here it comes.

Bracing himself, he said, "Boss, about those people you told us to keep an eye on at the dance the night we boarded—there has been progress."

Wu Chang raised an eyebrow and said, "Who are they?"

Sword Star said, "Although they are Gao Mu nationals, they actually represent Midi Country. We searched them and found Midi Country intelligence agent credentials."

Wu Chang frowned. "If they're agents, why would they carry their credentials on them?"

What spy carries proof of infiltration on their person? If someone searched them and found it, wouldn't they be exposed?

Sword Star explained, "According to their account, their espionage activities are tacitly approved by the Gao Mu upper echelons. The credentials on them are their last line of defense. No matter what secrets they steal, no matter what heinous crimes they commit—even indiscriminate attacks on civilians—as long as they aren't beaten to death on the spot, once they flash their credentials, the Gao Mu people won't dare touch them."

Wu Chang shook his head. No wonder those people dared to slight him at the banquet, not even bothering to come up and say hello—turns out they had Midi Daddy backing them.

But then again, the president of Gao Mu and the military were both involved in the Xinyuzhou Sect's ritual. With such a good thing going on, of course they couldn't keep it from Midi Daddy.

The Xinyuzhou Sect has been conducting large-scale human sacrifices for decades on end, with tens of thousands of victims. Wu Chang had previously wondered how they managed to keep it all under wraps.

Li Zaishi, as the controller of the Star Heaven Group, had not a single trace of this matter in his memory, which meant they had not relied on the plutocrats' power.

If it was Midi, not local Gao Mu forces, that suppressed the incidents, then everything made sense.

As the strongest superpower on the plane, Midi Country's greatest advantage lies not in military might, but in its control of public opinion.

Whenever Midi Country wishes, no matter how big the incident, they can easily erase every voice related to it and release some explosive scandals to divert the world's attention.

And people's attention to any one thing usually lasts only seven days. Once everything has passed, very few people continue to pursue it.

The ships sacrificed in the Sunken Ship Belt must have been suppressed in exactly that way.

But with Midi Country involved, the nature of this matter is different.

It means that as long as Midi Country is there to clean up their mess, the Gao Mu side, in order to complete the ritual or eliminate evidence, can act with reckless abandon, with no bottom line.

A grand scheme spanning decades, with all parties involved—a single sacrifice incident, if exposed, would be an earth-shattering scandal. If everything were exposed, even Midi Country would struggle to keep it buried.

Wu Chang's face showed a solemn expression. He suddenly realized that the hidden side quest Cui Chengze had brought contained a rather sizable pit.

Rescuing the hostages is easy, but ensuring they can return to land alive without being silenced is not as simple as one might imagine.

(End of this chapter)