Chapter 527: Utopian Little Society, Cradle of Geniuses!

[At the entrance, He Xiangdong made a welcoming gesture toward you.]

["Mr. Chen Dong, welcome to our underground base."]

[Ah Dou sat on horseback, marveling.]

["Uncle Chen, you were right, they really are an underground organization!"]

[You looked around, and thanks to the effect of "Reverse Engineering," you could see this place was filled with countless cultivation artifacts.]

[Formations were everywhere, maintaining environmental stability.]

[The glowing sphere at the top was a primal spiritual treasure, and behind it there was another slightly smaller sphere that wasn't currently glowing, also a primal spiritual treasure, presumably used to imitate the moon.]

[On the cliffs at the edges, countless karst caves were scattered about, with strange birds lurking inside, like guardians of this space.]

[The cultivators here had basically all mastered divine marks. You could see many cultivators using divine marks to help farmers and workers labor, or to speed up the efficiency of building bridges and paving roads.]

[The divine marks they used actually came in three colors: golden civilian marks, red noble marks, and a kind of black emperor-level divine mark that you had only seen once before, in your last simulation, when Second Sister Chen Yue used it.]

["Someone here uses emperor-level divine marks?"]

[He Xiangdong nodded.]

["These are heaven marks."]

["Heaven marks?"]

["Divine marks are divided into heaven marks, earth marks, and human marks. They were originally created by our Human Race's ancestors so that even low-grade cultivators could borrow a portion of divine ability power.

That way, even those with poor aptitude could have the power to protect themselves.

After the 'Great Turmoil,' our Human Race was instead forbidden from learning divine marks.

Those alien races stole our divine marks and changed them into emperor marks, noble marks, and civilian marks.

They even divided the learning of divine marks into ranks and grades.

But our ancestors divided divine marks into three categories based only on three different levels of difficulty.

If you didn't want to spend too much time learning, you'd study the simplest human marks. If you wanted to learn the strongest and hardest, you'd study heaven marks. That's all there was to it."]

[From He Xiangdong's words, you heard yet another new term.]

["'Great Turmoil'?"]

[He Xiangdong patted your shoulder.]

["Mr. Chen Dong, there are many things here that you couldn't possibly have known about in the outside world before. Why don't we sit down and talk slowly."]

["Yes, yes, yes."]

[You loved gathering intelligence more than anything.]

[Coming to this Torch Society base was truly the right move!]

[He Xiangdong first brought you and Ah Dou to settle in at the base.]

[And gave you a brief introduction to the base's basic situation.]

[The Torch Society's original goal was to protect geniuses from persecution by the alien races.]

[But protection alone wasn't enough. Once you took someone in, you had the responsibility to cultivate them.]

[Through the help of certain capable and righteous people, like Ji Wuqing, someone from a major faction who "betrayed her own kind," they gained resources to supply geniuses for cultivation.]

[The Torch Society didn't always hide away in frustration. They also organized certain battles to seize cultivation resources from the alien races.]

[It was just that the targets the Torch Society chose were basically small factions on second-tier stars. They'd organize a group of experts to go blow up some fish, then run after blowing them up.]

[The place where these Human Race geniuses and seized resources were gathered was the Torch Society's base.]

[There were many such bases across the universe. Vermilion Violet Star was just one of them.]

[The aptitude of the Human Race was like opening a blind box, so even the descendants of geniuses could turn out to be ordinary mortals.]

[The Torch Society generally wouldn't let these mortals leave the base to fend for themselves. As long as they were willing, they could stay and continue living in the base.]

[Although the Torch Society's base was underground, after formation modifications, it could still farm, tend sheep, raise fish, cultivate silkworms, and so on.]

[Add to that the growing number of mortals providing ample labor, and all living materials could be self-sufficient.]

[This base was like a utopia, with no rulers or ruled.]

[Everyone simply did what they were good at and improved their lives through barter.]

[Of course, it wasn't barter anymore. Each base had its own currency system.]

[The Torch Society's upper echelon would assign some people to manage base order, but they couldn't be called rulers, at most like neighborhood property management handling some public affairs.]

[Since Torch Society members, once they encountered mission changes or identity exposure, would be unable to return to the base for a long time.]

[The base "property management" was constantly changing. There was simply a set of positions, and whoever had time to stay at the base would take on the role.]

[In this base, you saw the Human Race geniuses who were being protected.]

[There was nothing particularly special about them.]

[The younger ones attended school with ordinary children, memorizing ancient texts, learning arithmetic, understanding astronomy and geography. If they didn't finish their studies, they'd get their palms smacked by the teacher.]

[Once they reached the appropriate age, they had to both cultivate and complete their studies, running back and forth between the two, not planning to fall behind in either, with people supervising them.]

[Sometimes during busy farming seasons, they also had to do farm work alongside the residents.]

[A bit older, once their studies were complete, cultivation was an endless path, so dedicated cultivation masters would guide them one-on-one.]

[Even later, when cultivation hit a bottleneck or life became confusing, there was only one option, go out and gain experience.]

[The Torch Society also understood the principle that sturdy flowers cannot be grown in a greenhouse.]

[They allowed these protected geniuses the right to choose to leave the base.]

[About seventy percent would choose to leave.]

[Some of them later became stronger and came back, continuing the Torch Society's will.]

[Some put down roots outside and never returned.]

[Some fell on the road of experience.]

[And a small number became traitors, leaking the base's secrets.]

["There are even traitors?"]

["Of course there are. Human nature is complex, and temptations are countless."]

["Then you shouldn't let them out."]

["Then what would this place become, a prison?"]

["Aren't you in great danger when you encounter betrayers?"]

["Traitors or not, the cause we pursue is equally dangerous."]

["But you've carried on for so many years, surely you have a defense mechanism."]

["Naturally, but each base has its own methods. I'm not at liberty to disclose ours. If you can stay here long-term, you'll learn them yourself."]

[He Xiangdong led you on a walk around the base, introducing all sorts of things along the way.]

[Finally, you got to a topic you'd wanted to understand from the very beginning.]

["On our side, we call that event the 'Great Turmoil.' On the alien races' side, they call it the 'Great Counterattack.'"]

["I think I've guessed a little..."]

["It seems no one on Blazing Star gave you information about this. Over there it's all single-line contact, so conversations like ours are indeed rare. If you'd like to understand, I can explain it to you in detail."]

[He Xiangdong stood on the base's long street, looked up at the primal spiritual treasure light sphere mimicking the sun hanging in the sky, let out a long sigh, and then began to speak.]

["All of this has to be traced back to the Celestial Emperor era..."]