Chapter 785.1: Burning Corps Vs Death Coast

“Looks like quite a lot really has been happening out on the wasteland lately, in places we didn’t even know about.”

Aboard the Heart of Steel, inside the captain’s cabin. After listening to the recording Ample Time had sent over, a fatherly smile appeared on Chu Guang’s face, though that handsome, youthful face of his didn’t look old in the slightest.

“Hmmm...” Sitting on Chu Guang’s right shoulder, Little Seven gently swung its legs, resting its chin in both hands as it continued lazily, “Feels like it won’t be long before Master can retire and spend all his time with Little Seven!”

“Hahaha.” Chu Guang laughed happily, casually closed the holographic interface in front of him, and teased the little fellow sitting on his shoulder. “Retirement is probably still a long way off, though getting to live a retired lifestyle ahead of schedule might not take all that long.”

To be honest, when he had first recruited those guys, he had never imagined they would be this capable. Sometimes they could even anticipate what he wanted them to do. The forum was never short of wild theorists making things up, claiming that only dragons among men, reincarnated kings of soldiers, or dragon-god sons-in-law could get a helmet.

But in truth, as long as someone wasn’t too obsessive or deranged, they had a chance of getting selected.

Compared with accomplished big shots in reality, Chu Guang actually preferred giving ordinary people a chance to begin a second life. After all, what favor could possibly outweigh the favor of giving someone a new life?

Even from nothing more than the perspective of brand loyalty, players selected through this mechanism were more inclined to become maintainers of order within the Wasteland Online virtual community rather than people who would attack the existing order. And honestly, that was enough.

The wasteland had no shortage of geniuses. What it lacked were normal people.

Chu Guang had never expected to create a flawless utopia out of thin air using the brains of a bunch of geniuses. As long as his little players did the jobs in their hands properly within the limits of their ability, that was enough.

And yet, even though he didn’t demand much of them, those players kept surprising him again and again.

Chu Guang couldn’t help thinking that perhaps before long, even his role as the faction boss could be written out of the cutscenes. His clever little critters had not only learned to update the game content themselves, they had even started designing game rules for the NPCs.

Just then, a communication request from New Alliance Central Command popped up in the upper-right corner of the holographic screen.

Seeing that a call had come in, Little Seven gave a little heave-ho, hopped down from Chu Guang’s shoulder of its own accord, and sat back down on the pen holder.

Without hesitation, Chu Guang extended a finger and selected the button to accept the call.

Pale blue holographic beams quickly intertwined in midair, drawing out Old White’s upper body. He was still wearing his Dragon Cavalry exoframe, with an XB-1 Howler resting on his shoulder. Behind him was clearly the interior of a landing craft.

Looking solemnly at Chu Guang, Old White stood in full battle gear, lowered the bolter beside himself, then struck his armored chest with his right fist in salute. “Respected Administrator, the forces on the southern front have finished assembling! We await only your command. At any time, we can seize the coastline of Ocean Edge Province for you!”

The landing operation plan and its codename had been decided long ago. Chu Guang had reviewed it a month earlier and signed his name on it. Before that day, the players stationed on North Island had rehearsed the coming battle countless times.

Perhaps imagining that this might end up in one of the game’s promotional PVs, Old White was taking the whole thing remarkably seriously, even placing a special call right before the operation began.

Chu Guang did not brush off how serious Old White was acting. He straightened his expression and solemnly answered the expectation in Old White’s eyes. “Excellent! I can already see victory in your eyes. The people of the New Alliance are waiting for your triumphant return. Do not disappoint their expectations! Now, begin the operation!”

Staring intently into those imposing eyes, Old White snapped to attention and cleanly lowered his helmet’s faceplate and visor.

That was the sign that the exoframe had entered combat mode.

“Copy!”

...

Elsewhere, in the hall bathed in holy light, 13 unusually shaped chairs were arranged around a circular conference room. Yet, only 10 people sat around the conference table.

The three who were absent were Luo Qian, the Beast King,” and the “Human Emperor,” who was currently commanding operations on the northern front in Ocean Edge Province.

And at the very center of the conference table stood a projected figure. His dark gray robe looked completely out of place among the surrounding white robes. Facing one scrutinizing gaze after another, Arzu felt his scalp go numb.

The situation was completely different from when he had stood here a year ago. Back then, Luo Qian had just suffered a defeat, their stronghold had fallen, and even those Pathfinders had been questioning whether they had chosen the wrong path. That had allowed Arzu to stand there with complete confidence and put forward the concept of the Second Sanctuary.

Not only had the Pathfinders sitting here lacked the confidence to refute him, the Chosen One had given him ample trust and support, handing the South Sea entirely over to him.

During that period, he and Chalas had cooperated and produced quite a number of useful results, such as arming Mutant Humans with technologies possessed by the survivors of the South Sea.

Those had all been his achievements. Even if the South Sea had later performed disastrously, no one could deny his contribution to the Torch Church.

And yet, that was exactly the problem. The performance of the South Sea had been so catastrophically poor that it overshadowed everything he had accomplished. With Chalas defeated and North Island occupied by the New Alliance, the Torch Church had completely lost its chance to open strategic space to the south. Now they were like crickets trapped inside a cage, surrounded on all sides by people eager to drag them to the gallows...

Facing one doubtful gaze after another, Arzu gulped once and forced himself to speak. “We can no longer count on the South Sea. Our indoctrination doesn’t work on the locals.” Trying to defend his failure, he continued at a rapid pace, “They’re completely different from the survivors of Ocean Edge Province or even the Brocade River Province. The wasteland there has been over for too long. The locals are no longer wastelanders in the classical sense. They’re all residents of Shelter 70. This differs from our initial judgment.”

Saying that the indoctrination didn’t work was putting it mildly. A certain destroyer captain had even used him in reverse and tricked him into feeding false intelligence to Chalas. Those fishermen were far more cunning than he had imagined, playing with him like a Laken from the sea.

“However, we haven’t lost yet. We merely need to put the plan to study Na Fruit expansion into the ocean on hold for a while.” Taking a deep breath, Arzu looked around at the assembled Pathfinders and continued solemnly, “What about going west? Since taking Coral City in the short term is no longer realistic, I propose that we carry out a strategic relocation toward the west.”

As he spoke, he lightly moved his index finger, opening a map in front of himself and pointing at the Poro Province before he continued his explanation. “This land lies directly beside Silvermoon Bay. Cross one sea and you reach the eastern Great Desert. Follow the equator straight across and you reach the center of the old world, the ruins of the space elevator... I’ve heard that a group calling themselves the Enlightenment Society operates there. Like us, they once investigated clues related to Project Torch. They should be able to understand our situation.”

“Although we have fundamental disagreements, if we can establish contact with them, then at the very least we won’t have to face the pressure from the Mutant Slime Mold Research Committee alone. Moreover, the Poro Province has an enormous population of survivors. Those people may be somewhat stupid and unable to assist our research at the technical level, but they should be perfectly suitable as a breeding ground for Mutant Humans. So...”

Arzu took a deep breath and swept his gaze across the Pathfinders seated around the table as he concluded. “I believe it would be a good destination...”

The conference room remained silent for a while. Not a single sound could be heard.

If Arzu hadn’t known perfectly well that the Pathfinders didn’t need sleep, he might have thought these old fellows had dozed off.

The first to break the silence was the Chosen One seated at the head of the conference table. He sighed and gently shook his head. “It won’t work.”

Arzu froze. Gulping again, he asked anxiously, “How could it not work...”

“Because we discussed the plan you just described a long time ago.” Interrupting him in an unquestionable tone, the Chosen One extended an index finger and lightly tapped the air. Pale blue beams stretched forward one after another, and within a few breaths they had outlined the entire terrain and topography of the Poro Province.

It was not its current terrain, but its terrain during the Wasteland Era. The map was far more detailed than the miniature projection floating in front of Arzu. Even the mountains and rivers across the land were visible.

Clearly, apostles had once visited the region and only reached their conclusion after conducting a thorough investigation.

Looking at the stunned Apostle standing before him, the Chosen One continued calmly, “About a decade ago, we already considered choosing the Poro Province, which had not been interfered with by the Post-War Reconstruction Committee, as our starting point. It has a wider area than Ocean Edge Province and more wastelanders living in chaos. Most importantly, it lies far outside the sight of the Enterprise, the Academy, and the Great Rift Valley. There was a risk of attracting the Army’s attention, but they were unlikely to act against us. And even if they wanted to, the Great Desert lies between us. If they truly came, they would not necessarily be our match.”

“Then why?” Arzu looked at the Chosen One and asked urgently. “Why didn’t we go there?”

If they had gone there, the Academy never would have noticed them this quickly!

They might not even have been discovered until they expanded into Sunset Province!

Of course, that could have produced other variables, but compared with their present situation, those possibilities were hardly worth mentioning.

Facing Arzu’s confusion, the Chosen One’s voice carried a rare trace of helplessness. “Because of the red earth.”

Red earth?

Arzu froze.

What did that have to do with anything?!

But the moment that thought crossed his mind, realization suddenly struck him.

Could it be?!

As though confirming his guess, the Chosen One slowly clenched his right hand into a fist. The map of the Poro Province floating in front of him crumpled like crushed paper, transforming into a lump of red earth.

“The Poro Province contains a special kind of soil, or rather, a fungus attached to that soil. It has almost no effect on ordinary organisms, but it drains nutrients from the soil and prevents virtually every other microorganism from growing in it... Clostridium tetani, Clostridium botulinum, and so on. Like animal remains buried in the red earth, they are digested by it.”

The absence of all sorts of other harmful bacteria and viruses was, in fact, one reason red earth could be eaten directly.

Normally speaking, humans couldn’t eat dirt not merely because it was indigestible. A major reason was that harmful substances in soil could poison or even kill a person. What made red earth remarkable was that while accumulating a small amount of nutrients, it killed most harmful substances.

In other words, if Na Fruit encountered it, there was a high probability that the red earth would digest it and turn it into more red earth.

Arzu stared at the Chosen One in disbelief. He gasped in shock as he struggled to squeeze out a sentence. “How... how is that possible? Something that looks like garbage can actually suppress the result of more than a decade of our research?”

“And yet that is the truth.” Looking into those shocked eyes, the Chosen One sighed softly. “And don’t underestimate it. It was a product completed by scholars of the Prosperity Era during the early Wasteland Era. You know very well how capable the scholars of that time was. Singularity-level technology was, in fact, something they once came close to touching but ultimately failed to reach.”

The Apostle named Yore, who had been captured by the New Alliance and imprisoned somewhere in the River Valley Province, had been a scholar from the Prosperity Era. The anti-radiation drug and radiation-removal drug he had developed during the early Wasteland Era were still, even 200 years later, the economically optimal solution for removing radiation damage on the wasteland.

“According to our experimental results, Na Fruit will be consumed by red earth just like corpses and feces buried within it. If we cannot find a technical method for making Na Fruit consume the red earth instead, then the rapidly expanding Na Fruit will ultimately become a breeding ground that accelerates the spread of the red earth, allowing the latter to expand across the grasslands of the Poro Province like weeds.” After a brief pause, the Chosen One continued, “This runs completely contrary to our ideals, and it would also be meaningless.”

The Torch Church’s philosophy was to elevate humanity as a species into a higher form of existence, not to turn humanity into an edible lump of shit. That was why they had ultimately abandoned their plan to enter the Poro Province and instead chose the relatively more balanced Ocean Edge Province as the first stop for the Kingdom of Heaven.

Although General Rowell obviously could not have known what would happen 200 years later, through sheer coincidence, he had once again saved the survivors of the Poro Province.