War Begins

"Holy crap, that's badass!" "As expected of the Northern Realm! Truly deep pockets and massive scale!" A continuous stream of exaggerated applause and praise erupted over the comm channel. "The moment they make a move, it's something extraordinary!" Only Yellowbeard was furious, whirling his head to glare back with blazing rage. *Ji, you bastard, I fucking knew you were up to no good! You were waiting right fucking here for me, weren't you?!* Don't ask whether North Wind actually possessed fusion bombs or not. Now, they did! No need to act tough anymore, Grandmaster—because your toughness has arrived. This time, even if it wasn't shit, it was smeared all over them now. After all—the Northern Realm really did possess such things! If word got out, would people believe that North Wind had gone insane and brought out a fusion bomb to play with, or that Ji Jue, an artisan certified for less than a year, had hand-crafted a giant bomb with his bare hands?! Never mind whether outsiders would believe it—three minutes ago, Yellowbeard himself wouldn't have believed it either! Of course, he could always present evidence, but unfortunately, since that dog Ji Jue dared to use it, he would certainly have a way to dump the chamber pot squarely onto North Wind's head. Besides, evidence was only useful when people were actually willing to believe it! Now things were just great: each side held leverage over the other. When everyone held dirt on each other, it was the same as nobody holding dirt. They were back at the same starting line—except Yellowbeard looked as if he had just eaten shit, grim and utterly foul. Meanwhile, Ji Jue gestured politely toward the projection. "After you, Grandmaster." The door has been opened, and the path has been paved. Next, it's your turn to carry. I can't be the MVP for everything, can I? Our best days are yet to come! The horn sounded once more. Like the roar of a dragon. Illusory light rose from the pitch-black sea, curling around the warships one after another. Out of the void suddenly emerged outlines resembling scales, faintly draping over each vessel. Drums boomed loud and clear. Amid the deep resonance, the warships, originally inanimate dead matter, began to exude faint auras of life, becoming animated. Surging waves manifested out of thin air, tumbling forward directly within the wake of the advancing fleet. The farther forward they pressed, the more colossal the scale grew, until finally, spurred on by the horns, a horrifying tsunami formed that connected sky and sea, blotting out the sun. Waves hundreds of meters high abruptly reared up from the sea surface, churning and surging violently ahead. They shattered the phantoms continually manifesting over the water, sweeping toward the deserted island with irresistible momentum. Until that blood-dripping eye abruptly manifested, gazing toward this direction. The towering sea waves vanished in an instant like an illusion, as though they had never existed. Ascension—no, an inherited art of the Abyssal Depths. Overriding the world with one's own will, replacing everyone's observation with one's own observation, and choosing one's own reality to rewrite existence! But could it rewrite fast enough? The moment the ocean waves vanished into thin air, the Dragon Bone Fleet drove straight in without pause. Horns blared incessantly, and at the very front, blazing light burst from the eyes of the thunder god figurehead. Immediately afterward, Twilight manifested once more—streaks of radiant light filled the sky, blanketing everything. Sixteen! After a prolonged accumulation of power, it erupted abruptly: sixteen meteors plummeted from the heavens, all locked onto the deserted island, the ruins, and the tower, howling as they fell. Flames and thunderous roars followed in succession; the earth shook, and the Nether Sea surged with waves. Immediately after, amidst churning, boiling sounds, illusory tentacles squirmed up from the sea. Calamity beasts that once ruled the depths remanifested from illusions, their mountain-like bodies slowly rising. Massive mouthparts opened, and tentacles wrapped around a warship, hauling it into an abyssal maw. Yet atop the prow, a figure suddenly soared into the air! Yellowbeard! The flamberge in his hand burst with boundless radiant light, turning into a true sword of fire! Flames that bridged heaven and earth erupted from his body— Hero's Seed: Surtr! In an instant, merging as one with the hero he had cultivated, the furious, roaring Grandmaster swung his blade. Fire blasted out like artillery bombardment. In a flash, it sliced the entire calamity beast clean in half at the waist! Boundless flames danced across the sea, spreading and miraculously burning fiercely upon the water, rapidly turning the expanse into a sea of fire! "The warm lands are right before us!" Amidst the flames and sea, Yellowbeard, transformed into a giant, raised his blade once more, pointing at the deserted island ahead and roaring: "Order the fleet—forward!" Warm lands—warm lands!!!! In countless pairs of eyes, a fanatical light ignited. No bitter cold that could freeze off fingers and noses even at the height of summer; no ice disasters that could easily obliterate entire settlements; no monsters spawned endlessly from the permafrost sheets... A fertile land that could be farmed, occupied, and used to thrive and multiply lay right before their eyes! Even if it was still narrow and small; even if, constrained by the situation of the Thousand Islands and their mission, they could not fully migrate here; even if countless wars still awaited in the days ahead... It didn't matter. None of it mattered! As long as they could gain land beyond the White River, the sacrifice was worth it! Even death was worth it! "North Wind bless us!!!" Amid countless battle cries, the Dragon Bone Fleet sped forward. Eerie, ethereal wings of spiritus rose from the warships, followed by dragon bones awakening in blood sacrifice, flesh and blood manifesting atop the decks. As if breaking free from locks, skeletal dragon after skeletal dragon soared from the warships into the sky, hovering and wheeling as they spewed breath and flame with wild abandon. First, the paradise forged by the Huangliang Relic went out of control, crashing temporarily under the infiltration and erosion of the Worm. Then, a bunch of Northern Realm madmen recklessly swung their blades and charged straight into their house. And on top of that, who the hell knew what else was coming next! The Blood Eye atop the tower froze, wondering how the world had turned upside down so fucking fast when it hadn't even blinked! For a brief moment, the eye reflected a dazed bewilderment that was all too familiar to Ji Jue. What on earth just happened? Incomprehensible. Did the world line just shift in the blink of an eye?! But there was no more time for hesitation. On the deserted island, at the very summit of the tower, a massive pitch-black cavity burst open. Immediately after, countless giant moths surged forth like a tidal wave, sweeping in to blanket the sky. Intermingled among them were numerous bizarre half-human, half-moth beings. Seeming to possess no physical form, they came and went without a trace, shifting between illusion and reality at will, astonishingly fast. They hungrily preyed upon souls and could even channel the power of the Paradise of Myriad Phenomena, turning dreams into reality at any moment... "Tsk, mothmen," the two An brothers said, their eyes lighting up as they sat on Ji Jue's deck enjoying the show. An Neng remarked with awe, "What a rare breed. I thought they were already extinct." "Doesn't matter," An De said through a mouthful of chicken wing. "We're about to slaughter them all anyway, so they might as well be extinct." While wiping his mouth, he flicked his fingers. A thunderous roar of shattered air detonated as a fissure tore straight through the sky-filling black tide. Wherever the invisible force passed, it sliced all the moths filling the sky to ribbons! Only when a deep fracture abruptly appeared upon the tower did everyone finally see clearly what had been hurled from his hand in that split second— A colossal axe blade more than half a person tall! The moment An De beckoned, the axe blade vanished instantly. Immediately after, it whistled away again—flying light darting, the hunting finger executing violence—and in an instant, another mothman detonated into powder. Well, this time it was An De's iron hammer. An Neng glared over in fury. "You're fucking pulling this again?!" "I saw it first!" An De argued. "You're fucking first every single time! First to see, first to arrive, first to get, first to enjoy! Why don't you fight to be first when it's time to die?!" "The kill is mine anyway, so what are you gonna do about it?!" "You son of an An, you really don't know what's good for you!" "Aren't you fucking named An too?!" "I'm named after your dad!" Ji Jue stared at the filial-piety brawl between the two brothers, overflowing with references to each other's parents, looking like he had lost all will to live. He didn't want to speak, nor could he find the words. In any case, while their mouths hurled insults, their hands were by no means idle. Setting aside iron hammers and great axes, even the skewers left over from roasted chicken wings, the plates in their hands, the chairs under their asses, and even the barbecue grill Ji Jue had just bought—these two bastards hurled whatever they could get their hands on. No, seriously, where did your family pick up this damn habit?! *Xiao An really is the best after all...* Ji Jue sighed repeatedly, then heard the three-headed serpent's furious roar and hiss reverberating across heaven and earth. The Huangliang Relic shuddered violently, and the entire alienated forbidden domain trembled along with it, beginning to shrink inch by inch. Its scale was halved in an instant, yet the Worm's interference and erosion grew increasingly difficult. Between illusion and reality, the colossal body of the three-headed serpent manifested once again, spewing a venomous torrent of spiritus. And on the deserted island, figure after figure leaped into the air. Such familiar auras and insignia... Ji Jue's eyes slowly narrowed. "The Dragon Cult..." It really has been a long time! "Isis, prepare to attack." Ji Jue slowly raised his hand. "Haven't seen them in so long—shouldn't we give them a proper greeting?" Yet in that very instant, amid the vault of heaven interwoven with dusky yellow, pitch black, and crimson, a spark of starlight suddenly leaped forth. Dazzling and clear. Blossoming with brilliance. Like the intricate surface of a crystal catching the blazing sun, projecting a dazzling radiance of rainbow hues. It brought the entire world to an abrupt silence! In the dead silence, that pinpoint of crystalline light slowly unfurled like an eye gazing down from the heavens. Countless specks of Dust gathered of their own accord, swirling and turning into an immense vortex that blanketed the entire sea. And ten thousand meters high in the sky above the earth, within that vortex, a gateway to another world seemed to open—a crystalline pyramid thousands of meters long extended outward, magnificent and colossal, like a pillar supporting the heavens. It continued to grow and expand even further— Across a magnificent scale measured in kilometers, dragon fire surged and entwined; flames of destruction and material crystallization fused together, tearing through the heavens and churning wind and clouds. Finally, it coalesced into the shape of a great spear. Translucent and crystalline, yet sharp and ferocious. Thus, amidst earth-shaking echoes, it locked from afar onto the unrealistic dreams and delusions below... The Spear of the Desolate Ruins plummeted from the heavens!