Chapter 400 - 342: Hive: Warning! The Enemy Has Initiated a Scorched-Earth Operation

"You Transcendents are really something else!" Chu Bamboo pursed his lips, unsure what kind of expression he should be making.

"Aren’t you a Transcendent as well?" the Pope said noncommittally.

Chu Bamboo gave the Pope a long, hard look but didn’t waste his breath trying to recruit the man. He already knew the answer.

’Still, maybe next time I should leave an order... see if I can get a message to God, have Him leave another Oracle? If there were a holy decree, it wouldn’t be completely impossible to make the God Worship Sect submit, would it?’ Thoughts flickered through Chu Bamboo’s mind.

But then, Chu Bamboo realized the chances of success were slim. After all, his good brother had surely thought of contacting God before! And the final result... well, the current situation spoke for itself.

He shook away the distracting thoughts.

"Second question. About C—I mean, the Heaven-Ascending Ladder on the left!" Chu Bamboo paused briefly before asking, "Is there any information about it... that you can disclose to me?"

"..." The Pope looked troubled. "The Heaven-Ascending Ladder leads to a secret sanctuary of my God Worship Sect! I’m afraid I cannot tell..."

"I’m talking about the Heaven-Ascending Ladder itself," Chu Bamboo interrupted.

"..." The Pope gave Chu Bamboo a strange look, contemplated for a long moment, and then said, "The Heaven-Ascending Ladder... is just the Heaven-Ascending Ladder, isn’t it?"

"?" Chu Bamboo was silent for a long, long time. After staring at the Pope for a moment, he realized the man genuinely thought that way. The corner of his mouth twitched. "...You win!"

Chu Bamboo suddenly understood. The Heaven-Ascending Ladder had existed in this land for a very, very long time... Perhaps the Pope had grown up watching the Heaven-Ascending Ladder from the moment he was born—in his worldview, the Heaven-Ascending Ladder truly was something akin to common knowledge!

"?" The Pope’s expression grew even more confused.

"There’s one last thing." Chu Bamboo’s expression turned grim. "Originally, I was going to ask... if you have any other ruins under your control! Whether it would be suitable for me to enter... Alright, don’t give me that look! The reason I’m not asking is that I know you’d never agree! So, the last thing I’m going to say is..."

"Even though you won’t pledge allegiance to me, I’m going to have to ask you to mobilize your forces... and stabilize the current balance of Extraordinary power within the Celestial Capital."

Chu Bamboo rubbed the bridge of his nose, feeling a headache coming on. Only after truly conquering the Celestial Capital and compiling the data from Nuwa did he feel the full weight of the trouble he was in. As the saying goes, conquering a kingdom is hard, but ruling it is even harder.

He didn’t even have to think about it to know... The Extraordinary Power belonging to Daqian, even if it hadn’t moved against his army yet, must be in a state of disarray. Of course, after hearing what Huo Qiming said, Chu Bamboo wasn’t too worried about these Transcendents from proper lineages—

But he was worried about the Demon Sects and the unaffiliated Transcendents!

Who knew if they would see the chaotic situation as an opportunity to make a move?

To say nothing of the others, what if the All-Powerful Lineage took advantage of this chaos to pull something like what happened in Jinghai City... Chu Bamboo didn’t even dare to imagine how severe the consequences would be.

"I understand! It is what I should do." Realizing what Chu Bamboo was worried about, the Pope agreed without a second thought.

...

He walked out of the God Worship Sect’s main cathedral.

Chu Bamboo’s brow gradually furrowed as he gazed north with a heavy expression. ’How much longer can I live this time?’ he thought.

Chu Bamboo suspected that once news of the Celestial Capital’s fall reached the north, the Heavenly Monarch, after a brief hesitation, would once again use that Destiny Golden Dragon technique to assassinate him...

"Time is running out!" Chu Bamboo sighed softly. He beckoned to Huo Qiming to follow him while saying, "Hive, take control of the maglev car... Take me to the C Company headquarters!"

...

Upon seeing the C Company headquarters, Chu Bamboo was completely dumbfounded.

"...What is this thing? Who designed this? Is it meant to be so anti-human?" Chu Bamboo had Hive scan the building up and down with a drone and discovered that... the structure before him was seamlessly constructed, with no discernible doors or windows...

The headquarters wasn’t tall, only about five stories. Of course, that didn’t mean those five stories reached the heavens... Rather, at the very center of the headquarters was a massive, circular pillar that shot straight into the clouds...

After some thought, Chu Bamboo had the drone tentatively attack it. As expected... it didn’t leave a single scratch on the headquarters.

"...You try hitting it with your full strength!" Chu Bamboo said, looking at Huo Qiming beside him.

"It’s no use!" Huo Qiming explained with a wry smile. "It won’t budge an inch! Even through dynastic changes, when the Celestial Capital beneath our feet was destroyed and rebuilt several times... this Ancient Ruin has always remained standing! My strength... is only decent, at best..."

"Mm." Chu Bamboo nodded slightly. After a moment’s thought, he picked the Little Mushroom Head off his left shoulder. "Xiaosan, do you know what this thing is... Okay, I don’t need you to explain what C Company is or isn’t... Do you know where the door is?"

’Maybe I can find the door... and then have Wall Announcements come open it...’

After a brief silence, Xiaosan spoke up: "Under the complete rejection mode, all entrances are completely sealed..."

"...Fine! That makes sense." Chu Bamboo’s face scrunched up. ’Right, if it were that easy to get in... some past dynasty would have probably found a similar key-type Divine Power User to open the door and get inside long ago...’

’What a pain!’

’Do I really have to return to the Real World... and wait for my good brother to make his move?’

Thoughts flashed through Chu Bamboo’s mind.

Suddenly, his Hive phone blared with a piercing alarm. Chu Bamboo’s expression changed, and he instantly whipped out his phone. "What happened?"

"Father!" Hive’s voice was grim. "I have detected a large number of troops from Yang Province appearing in the north! They have crossed the Great River and are attacking the shantytown districts... They have deployed wide-area-of-effect weapons... I have mobilized the remaining unmanned machines! Commencing countermeasures..."

"Warning! Warning! Enemy firepower is more than ten times our own... We are completely unable to intercept the artillery shells!"

"Initiating deep analysis... Confirmed: the enemy is executing a total scorched-earth strategy... attempting to effectively strike the Security Corps soldiers who captured the Celestial Capital by completely destroying the shantytown districts! Initiating search for solution..."

Hive processed with all its might. "Based on available assets, there is no current solution to this situation! Proposing a feint... a direct attack on Yang Province... Warning, timeframe insufficient! Reinitiating analysis..."