Three days later.
Three days passed since the multiples wars among the human race and all the other races broke out when the Earth entered the final stage of its evolution, officially moving towards the second evolutionary stage.
During these three days, the density of mana around the world gradually began to decrease in quantity as for every second that passed the world absorbed large amounts of energy. The huge dark purple clouds became shallower in color, their sizes became relatively more normal, the white lightning lost power, the sun slowly began to regain its radiance during the right hours or faded considerably when it was night time.
Apart from the Chinese Renaissance faction located south of Changping District, and the Transcendent faction located north of the same district, the number of human camps and factions fighting different enemies was too high to be mentioned.
Unfortunately, the smaller camps that were mainly led by petty thugs who after acquiring some power thought of themselves as some kind of god could not even withstand a day before being crushed by hordes of zombies, hordes of mutant beasts, hordes of goblins, or simply by the appearance of an enemy too powerful for them to handle.
In fact, the number of small camps that barely had three or four First Order existences as a leader was not small. These were the camps that did not want to join the larger camps that possessed military weaponry or a greater number of powerhouses and that stayed away from the areas where the larger camps roamed to avoid being caught and forced to join them.
Because the leaders did not want to lose the privilege of thinking of themselves as kings despite possessing deficient strength, the number of humans that were killed during the last 72 hours was definitely not a small number. Most of the small camps that numbered between 1000 and 5000 humans had been wiped out by the time the third day was over.
By the time the sun of day three disappeared and the sky darkened completely, the changes in the world were noticeable to anyone.
The air had become countless times purer to the point that all pollution had been wiped out by approximately 60%. In just a few hours, years upon years of waste accumulation in the air had been swept away! This would improve the life expectancy and health of all living things on Earth today and the future born would have a better environment in which to live!
The trees grew in size and consequently the quality of the oxygen that the trees and other plants released increased, and the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere that was bad for the body decreased. At the same time, the amount of pollutants that were absorbed by the leaves and roots went up, which also helped to improve the lives of everyone.
Countless plants with terrifying poisons or life-threatening characteristics were born, countless would surely die trying to find out if they were treasures or not. At the same time, many medicinal plants or plants with great benefits for the body and fighting strength were born or evolved.
The quality of already existing natural metals went up and new metals had been formed thanks to the enormous amount of mana the Earth had absorbed.
The ground became much harder than before so that the attacks of the past would no longer cause as much destruction as they did before. The natural laws became tremendously more powerful, which ensured the prosperity of the new world, and at least, it protected the world from possible destruction as a consequence of wars among the evolved beings that lived in it.
The distance between each layer of the atmosphere surrounding the world also increased to more than three times what they were in the past, which meant that not only the Earth had spread out sideways but also upwards and downwards.
(A/N: I know there is no up and down in space, just to get the reference)
* * *
Chinese Renaissance faction base, south gate.
Outside one of the small tents that had been erected outside the walls, a group of five soul evolvers had gathered and were currently silent as they watched the sky grow darker and darker until the moon ascended and the sun descended completely.
“It’s only been a few days but I feel like it’s been a life long since the last time I have seen the moon. Will this damn war ever end?” one of them commented as he pulled out a somewhat crushed cigarette box. Looking inside and noticing that he only had four cigarettes left, the level 31 man couldn’t help but growl under his breath, “Shit, it’s only the middle of the month but I already have so few left. This war has got on my nerves, I can’t stop smoking without realizing it. I haven’t even been able to sleep properly for the last few days!”
“Be thankful we at least get a box of cigarettes every month as part of our pay.” Another soul evolver with a thick beard pointed out. The man whose level had broken 35 during the last collision with the goblins looked off into the distance, more than 300 meters ahead, and said with respect and admiration, “Besides, at least we got some sleep… But, what about that person?”
That person? The other four blinked in confusion for a moment, however, a few moments later, all four turned their heads into the distance and understood what their comrade teammate wanted to point out.
Because the war against the goblins had been going on for many days, the soldiers and soul evolvers were naturally unable to return to their homes as it would take them too long to return to the front lines to fight an enemy that gave them practically no time to rest. Therefore, during the first day one of the high commanders ordered to set up several tents reinforced with mutant beast pelts near the gate so that the soldiers and soul evolvers would have a warm and more comfortable place to sleep during the few hours of daily rest they had.
This had not only been implemented at the south gate, of course, but the other three gates of the base had also carried out the same move. After all, the base functioned as a single whole even though there were four different battlefields.
The tents stretched from the gate to a maximum of 100 meters forward and then all the way across, each only a few meters from the other. It was not wise to move too far away from the base but neither could they allow troops to sleep inside for fear of enemies with skills like Invisibility sneaking in and causing havoc; which was why the gates were kept closed at all times except for three or four special occasions every day.
Novel “Since the night of Day 1, that person has not moved from that position except to kill enemies.” Said the bearded soul evolver. The respect and admiration in his voice were all too clear, and he did not try to hide it as he slowly said, “Even yesterday when that fucking storm broke out, that person stood there without moving. The number of goblins that-“
The words the soul evolver was saying stopped as he noticed a group of people walking towards the front. His eyes flashed as he said in a low voice, “They are here.”
It was not the eyes of the five soul evolvers in this group that moved toward the people walking across the cleared area from the south gate but rather all of them turned to look at the few people advancing carrying a steaming bowl of food.
“My lord, it is time for dinner…”
“Mm?” Bai Zemin turned and his eyes automatically landed on his beautiful housekeeper. He looked confused before blinking and saying with a smile, “Oh, Qin Ming. Is it that time already? I’m sorry to bother you every day.”
Qin Ming looked at the eyes of Bai Zemin and noticing the red veins and dark bags couldn’t help but feel sad as she said in a low voice, “My lord doesn’t need to thank me for anything…. On the contrary, people like me should say thank you to you.”
Bai Zemin shook his head without saying anything. He looked at his mother and saw that she was looking at him with eyes full of sadness. He still remembered how his mother was crying for practically two whole days due to the wounds he had suffered during the battle against the goblins and war zeppelins.
“Zemin, you…” Ye Linger hesitated for a moment before saying practically pleadingly, “Why don’t you at least get some sleep? You haven’t closed your eyes even once since the goblins started their attack… You didn’t even sleep after being critically wounded by those vile creatures.”
After being healed by Xia Ya and thanks to the practically miraculous effect of being able to modify his records, the condition of Bai Zemin had improved a little on the first day but he was still in bad shape. It wasn’t until day three and after receiving several healings from Xia Ya and the ten daily activations of Overlap Regeneration that Bai Zemin was able to recover but even now he was not at his 100%, he had only recovered to approximately 70-80% of his true peak.
“Mother…” Bai Zemin looked to his father Bai Delan for help but the traitorous old man simply looked away as if he knew nothing of what was going on there.
Little did Bai Zemin know that in reality, his father Bai Delan had tried to explain to Ye Linger the reason why their son was doing what he was doing. However, Bai Delan was chased by Ye Linger that night and almost beaten to death by the angry wife/mother.
After the first day, the number of goblins decreased noticeably, and by the second day, the humans of the base were able to get some rest. However, at irregular intervals, the goblins reappeared and the cunning creatures even moved silently using the darkness to try to catch the human camp off guard.
Not a few times Bai Zemin prevented disasters from occurring by staying awake day and night while the majority rested. Although the soldiers and soul evolvers took turns every so often to allow them to be in better condition in case a big battle broke out, the patrols were not many compared to the total size of the base; it was not possible to cover everything with a limited number of people.
Meng Qi simply looked at her brother silently but with eyes full of sorrow. She had also cried a lot when she saw the miserable condition Bai Zemin had been left in after fighting the Third Order goblins and the aerial forces of the enemy, but in contrast to Ye Linger, she managed to control her emotions significantly better in a shorter period of time.
“Don’t worry, mother. The war against the goblins will be over soon.” Bai Zemin said suddenly, surprising the small group of four people who over the past few days had come to bring him breakfast, lunch, snack, and dinner.
“Son, is that right?” The eyes of Bai Delan shone and he stepped forward to the three women. His excitement was enormous as things were not only complicated outside the walls but it was also becoming problematic to control the increasingly frightened survivors.
There were even rumors that the base would fall before the goblin attack in a short time and those who knew more about the goblins said that the women would be raped and the men killed. Although the government and police forces were trying to suppress such rumors, it was not easy to do so when explosions and war shots rang out constantly from all four directions.
“Em.” Bai Zemin nodded, and after a mouthful of the simple but delicious soup broth with large chunks of mutant beast meat, his eyes sparkled, “Oh! This is really good!”
Qin Ming and Ye Linger looked at each other for a moment and both women saw a trace of a smile in her eyes. The two women had teamed up and taken care of Bai Zemin’s meals during these days and had made sure to prepare them as heartily and as deliciously as possible despite it being something so simple.
Bai Zemin had insisted that he wanted to eat what the rest of the army ate, nothing fancy or extravagant. Even when his mother and the others tried to persuade him by saying that as one of the top fighters he needed to keep his body strong, Bai Zemin refused them all.
Only those who had followed Bai Zemin from Yanqing District to this place knew that on the battlefield, Bai Zemin hated to be treated with greater care than the others. In his eyes, what his troops ate was what he had to eat, because if they were willing to fight for him, then he had to show them that they were fighting for the right person.
This characteristic of his had affected Chen He, Zhong De, and all the other powerful commanders under his command. In fact, his act of humility had spread among the soldiers and soul evolvers throughout the base, and now even those who had never seen him before respected him; at the very least, 90% of the things said about him were positive.
All this not to mention the fact that the person called Bai Zemin brought a large army of powerful soul evolvers that had become the cornerstone of the entire base. Bai Zemin himself had gone deep into the battlefield on his own on more than one occasion to take down the strongest goblins and had saved the lives of everyone at the south gate at least on one occasion!
“Big brother, how do you know that the war is about to end? “Meng Qi asked in confusion and pointed out, “Although it is true that the number of goblins has decreased a lot lately, every time they appear there are always at least several hundred thousand of them and most of the time their numbers add up to millions… I wouldn’t be surprised if this war went on for another seven days.”
Meng Qi did not know that the goblins they had been fighting were creatures born from excess mana, therefore, her doubts were understandable.
Just as Bai Zemin was enjoying his dinner and preparing to give an explanation, the ground began to shake fiercely and his expression changed slightly as he raised his head and looked towards the horizon.
“It’s done.” Bai Zemin said as he took a bite of a piece of meat.
“Done?”
Bai Delan followed his son’s eyes, but despite being a powerful level 50 soul evolver and relatively close to evolving to Second Order, he didn’t understand what Bai Zemin saw as there was nothing there.
Was he talking about the food…? Such a thought popped into Bai Delan’s head. However, his son’s next words expressed countless things despite being few.
“It’s done.” Bai Zemin repeated. He ate the last of what was left in his bowl and stretched out his right hand, clutching tightly to the handle of his greatsword whose tip was firmly buried in the ground.
Crimson lightning flashed around the entire blade as if awakening from its slumber as he slowly said:
“Earth.”
“It has just completed its evolution officially.”
