“I have always been as bold as this. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have volunteered to break into the Godly Might Prison to rescue Commander Lei at the risk of my own life fearlessly!”
Li Yao took out a half-solid blue capsule that was covered in a film from his pocket. Breaking it apart, he smeared it on his face evenly. Together with the movement of his muscles and bones, he regained his original appearance very soon. Looking at Lei Chenghu in embarrassment, he reminded him that he once saved the man’s life before he asked in confusion, “When did you realize that I was not Li Wuji, Commander Lei? It wasn’t a bluff, was it?”
“Hehe. I never bother to deceive anyone through petty tricks. In the first place, I knew that it was not Li Wuji on the other side of the light beam. Or rather, I knew that somebody more terrible was hiding behind Li Wuji.”
Lei Chenghu said in despise, “I know exactly what kind of person Li Wuji is. How could he have established such a terrifying fleet? Besides, Li Wuji is a classic example of the leadership of the four Kurfürst families. He is selfish, cowardly, and considers his life more important than the whole universe. How on earth would he meet with me by himself at such great risks? If he is bold enough to reach my flagship on his own, I’ll cut my head off and give it to him as a gift!
“Now that Li Wuji has indeed shown up on my flagship, there can only be one explanation. He was forced to come here with a knife stuck to his throat and a gun pointed at the back of his head. That’s why he looked so gloomy a moment ago. He was scared that he would be killed because of you who was too intrepid. Am I right?”
“Commander Lei does have a pair of keen eyes. I did not know that there were so many loopholes in my plan.”
Li Yao coughed and asked curiously, “However, even if Li Wuji is not the star of the show, why did Commander Lei say ‘it’s indeed you’? It almost seems that you saw through my real appearance behind the camouflage.”
“It’s not difficult to guess your identity.”
Lei Chenghu continued casually, “The things you said and did under the identity of ‘Black Wind King’ have been spread throughout the Seven Seas Space Zone. I don’t believe that you would simply rest and stop playing more tricks after that.
“Also, Her Grace has told me about your real identity. Based on my evaluation of your action pattern, the odds that you play the ‘decapitation strategy’ and sneak to my side are very high. What I did not realize was that you would be coming in such an open manner.”
“That explains a lot. However, Commander Lei, I would like to make one thing clear first. I am absolutely different from the ‘Black Wind King’, who escaped shamelessly a hundred years ago after blackmailing the court, forcing you to wipe his a*s for him in the frontline with the soldiers of your hometown. As a matter of fact, Heiye Ming, the previous ‘Black Wind King’ has already been blown up into smithereens by me. No need to thank me! It’s my obligation!”
Pausing for a moment, Li Yao asked again, “Speaking of which, Commander Lei is quite audacious too. You knew it was me and that I was going to perform the decapitation strategy, but you still had the courage to enter my space shuttle. Are you not scared that I will attack and capture you all of a sudden? You should know that we are too close to each other right now. If I really want to do something, not just three Colossi, even if three hundred Colossi were outside, they wouldn’t be enough to stop me!”
“Will you do that?”
Lei Chenghu smiled and said, “I mean every word I said in the Letter To The Soldiers Of The Imperium as well as what I said to Li Wuji. As long as the civil war can be ended as soon as possible to preserve more strength of the Imperium, in order to deal with the Covenant Alliance and to create a new future for mankind, I can negotiate with anybody and compromise on any term.
“I said to you a long time ago that I prefer Cultivators to the shameless ‘false Immortal Cultivators’. Now that I am open to negotiations with a ‘false Immortal Cultivator’ like Li Wuji, why can’t I negotiate with a real Cultivator like you?
“I am very curious myself what kind of changes the Cultivators like you who haven’t done any notable things for a thousand years can bring to the Imperium when it is in such a great crisis. Besides, like you said just now, you were the one who rescued me from the Godly Might Prison. As a soldier of the Imperium, do I not even have the courage to meet my savior?”
“It’s great to know that Commander Lei is such a reasonable man!”
Li Yao took a long breath in relief. “Had I known it earlier, I would’ve talked to Commander Lei in a more straightforward way. All the hiding and tricks turn out to be unnecessary!”
“Then, let’s cut to the chase. Why has a real Cultivator like you come to me, an Immortal Cultivator who should be incompatible with you?”
Lei Chenghu’s voice gradually turned cold and hard, like a cannonball that had just been retrieved from a low-temperature arsenal. “There does not seem to be any middle ground between the two of us. At the very least, I will not compromise on the true path of immortality at all.”
Li Yao blinked and said, “I’m here merely to take my chances in a gamble.”
Lei Chenghu frowned. “What gamble?”
Li Yao declared resolutely, “A gamble that Commander Lei is a real Immortal Cultivator; a fundamentalist Immortal Cultivator that does not compromise. A gamble that everything you’ve been doing is truly for the Imperium and for the civilization of mankind, that you are not like the ‘false Immortal Cultivators’ out there who only consider Imperium, civilization, and true path of immortality as their slogans and will stomp on all their beliefs for their personal interests.
“I’m betting that you consider the future of mankind to be more important than anything else, even including Blackstar the Great that you admire the most!”
Lei Chenghu was silent for a moment. With dark brilliance flowing in his eyes, he observed, “You truly have learned His Majesty’s real identity. I’m appreciating you more and more, Cultivator Li Yao.
“Now that we are both aware of His Majesty’s existence, it’s all the more reason why you should give up trying. You know that there’s no way that I would betray His Majesty!”
“I wouldn’t say that.”
Staring at Lei Chenghu, Li Yao said, one word after another, “If you are a pure, real, selfless Immortal Cultivator and everything you do is for the interests of the Imperium of True Human Beings and the future of mankind, then you should stand out and object to Wuying Qi without any hesitation when his doings jeopardize the interests of the Imperium and will destroy the future of mankind!
“Getting to the bottom of it, the targets to which you pledge your loyalty and contribute your everything is the Imperium and the civilization of mankind, not a specific emperor, even if the emperor is Blackstar the Great. Am I correct to understand your belief in such a way?”
Stunned for a long time, Lei Chenghu was amused. “Do all the Cultivators have tongues as sharp as yours? Of course, His Majesty is not equal to the Imperium, much less the civilization of mankind. However, who else at the center of the cosmos today is more qualified to represent the Imperium and the civilization of mankind other than His Majesty? If I do not serve His Majesty with my life, should I work for the four worthless Kurfürsten, or the greedy, barefaced merchants of the Business Alliance of Ten Thousand Sectors, or even the Cultivators who have never accomplished anything?”
“To whom Commander Lei pledges your loyalty, or if you are simply working for yourself without serving anybody else, is really not my concern. I only want to kindly remind Commander Lei that something is wrong with Wuying Qi!”
Taking a deep breath, Li Yao said quickly, “Do you not feel that it was a very bad moment that you chose to jump to the Seven Seas Space Zone? Jumping over so soon would involve you in the dual vortexes of the Business Alliance of Ten Thousand Sectors and the coalition fleet of the four families. By the time you settle all the enemies in a couple of months, you will suffer tremendous losses on your own side!
“About the timing of the jump, I believe that it was Wuying Qi’s order. Therefore, he did not trust you at all, and he was planning to diminish the Astounding Thunder Fleet, the Business Alliance of Ten Thousand Sectors, and the four families’ coalition fleet together in the battle of Seven Seas, weakening you to the point that you would not be able to compete with him or the Covenant Alliance.
“Also, the Astounding Thunder Fleet had been a blade that was stuck to the throat of the four families. After it left the heartland of the four families and jumped to the Seven Seas Space Zone at the edge of the cosmos, while a victory in the regional battlefield could be secured, the capital would be wide open. The ace fleets of the four families would definitely take the chance to attack the capital in full scale!
“Even an amateur like me can see the horrible mistake. I don’t believe that a military expert like Commander Lei overlooked it. Therefore, have you asked ‘His Majesty’ what he was going to use to resist the ace fleets of the four families? The Imperial Guards who haven’t fought any real war for hundreds of years, the Deep Sea Fleet that is not large in scale, or the untrained soldiers who just surrendered to him?
“It’s impossible. Wuying Qi’s armed forces in daylight are far from enough to resist the attacks of the ace fleets of the four families. Therefore, he must have a secret weapon; an unstoppable, destructive secret weapon that, upon activation, may cause irreversible damage to the capital and even the whole Empyreal Terminus Sector!
“Commander Lei, you admire and worship Blackstar the Great so much that it is not wrong to say that you are his greatest supporter. Let me ask you, has he told you the details of the secret weapon so that you can be prepared? Come on, let’s make a bet. If he told you the secret weapon, I’ll cut my head off and give it to you!”
Lei Chenghu’s face was covered in gloominess. He said, “Li Yao, if you have come to my place just to sow discord with such lousy rhetoric, let’s stop wasting each other’s time! His Majesty is confident of his victory, and all the subjects need to do is to stride forward fearlessly. How can you speculate what is on a monarch’s mind? Even if it is not about a monarch and that it is just about a random general, do you not have the notion of ‘military secret’ in the world of Cultivators?”
