Chapter 1176: Chapter 175: Semifinals
[Iron Scorpion has died]
[Authentic Supermarket and Clinic, a new shop at the southeast corner of the plaza... achieved victory]
Clear words appeared above the arena. Li Ang looked at the rapidly fading and disappearing Iron Scorpion below him, shook his head with a bit of boredom, flicked his hand, reverted the characteristics of his wooden palm back to a normal human hand shape, and then walked towards the audience seats.
Wang Congshan saw Li Ang’s frowning, contemplative expression, and thought something was wrong with him. She asked nervously, "What’s wrong? Are you hurt?"
"I’m fine."
Li Ang waved his hand, "I was just thinking about the physiological structure of the Iron Scorpion. That creature is very... interesting. Maybe it can lead to some particularly novel inventions."
"Eh?"
Wang Congshan squinted at Li Ang. Since childhood, she was accustomed to Li Ang’s so-called "inventions."
The last time she heard this term, Li Ang claimed to have created an effective blood pressure medicine, which, after consumption, could not only control blood pressure and treat hypertension symptoms, but also allow the casual touch of high voltage electricity.
The effect was so good, it could almost rank in the top twenty of Li Ang’s list of small inventions and creations.
Incidentally, some of Li Ang’s other inventions include but are not limited to a new smartphone with a physical keyboard and replaceable batteries;
An electricity-driven electric generator;
Authentic and honest beef balls that are exactly as advertised;
A god-level freckle cream that can turn zebras into white horses, spotted dogs into white dogs, and if ordinary people apply a little daily, it can even remove corpse spots.
"It’s true."
Li Ang recalled,
The Sky Arena platform has a function for actively cleaning corpses.
When players die, their bodies instantly fade away to prevent situations where players cast a corpse explosion spell on themselves to perish with their opponent after death.
However, when Li Ang pierced through the Iron Scorpion with his wooden arm, he had already used a plant-fiber-based detection tool to scan the internal structure of the Iron Scorpion.
"The entity of that creature is a humanoid embryo, hidden on the back of the Iron Scorpion with a preliminary form.
The embryo has completed differentiation into the head, face, neck, torso, and limbs.
Although the facial features are not yet fully developed, its brain’s actual age already exceeds forty years, and it is not an artificial creation like a chimeric beast."
Li Ang pondered and slowly said, "The scorpion body of the Iron Scorpion is more like a giant incubator that stores the humanoid embryo, providing it with nutrients and a living environment.
You can imagine the humanoid embryo as a tank driver, using a neural network to control the tank—meaning the scorpion body—for combat.
The four half-skeletal bodies on Iron Scorpion’s back serve as auxiliary brains, assisting the embryo in better controlling the scorpion body.
Furthermore, the genetic sequence of the four skeletal bodies is very similar to the humanoid embryo—they should be direct blood relatives."
"Eh?"
Wang Congshan frowned slightly, "What does this mean..."
"Perhaps, the Iron Scorpion is one of the evolutionary directions for humanity’s future."
Li Ang said lightly, "It’s possible that, in a certain worldline, humanity’s living environment has severely deteriorated.
Humans have to devolve themselves and place themselves in replaceable, highly adaptive enhanced vehicles.
And incorporate their deceased relatives into external bodies as auxiliary minds."
Wang Congshan imagined for a moment, hesitantly saying, "Really? That’s... so weird."
"Who knows,"
Li Ang shrugged, saying nonchalantly, "The world is full of wonders. Perhaps in some dimension, there are hot dogs that eat people, or bamboo skewers that eat hot dogs."
Lately, Li Ang has been trying to deploy terminal vending machines to new worlds, some of which have oddities that greatly challenge Li Ang’s original understanding.
For example, a planet with gravity directed towards the sky, where all humanoid residents live in rock layer cities, and their most dangerous natural disaster is earthquakes—tectonic movement that can tear apart rock layers and cause an entire city to be dragged by gravity, thrown into the sky.
The Cat-Dog War planet—on this planet, the old intelligent species were wiped out in a global genetic weapon war, leaving the genetically adjusted cats and dogs to become torchbearers of civilization. They took up arms, rebuilt factories, and with the genetic hatred ingrained in them, split the world in half, each occupying one side, and started a fierce war that spanned millennia.
(Incidentally, the first to discover the terminal vending machines were wandering cat and dog pacifists. Using the special agent gear provided by Li Ang, they successfully infiltrated the presidential offices of both camps and brainwashed the highest leadership of both sides, successfully halting a war spanning millennia and shifting all animals’ focus to exploring the wider universe.
Li Ang also received the highest honor medal of the Cat-Dog planet—the Good Human Award)
There’s even a ghost planet—the residents there are all deceased spirits, while the living are terrifying urban legends akin to horror tales. Even Ghost Mama warns ghost children, "Be careful or the living will take you away" if they don’t go to sleep.
Just as the item description says, the transmission targets of the terminal vending machines are truly random, with great spans between planets, seemingly not as purpose-driven as the scripts and tasks in deathmatch games.
Li Ang sat nonchalantly where he was, thinking and waiting for the Colt Revolver to finish reloading. Soon, new players started appearing on the twenty-eighth floor one after another.
Death Soul of the Demon Scientist Alliance,
AIM from the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Supernatural Accident Place,
Dawn, Ares, Breeding Homomorph, among others, from the European Heavy Industry Group.
The Transcendents from the European Heavy Industry Group were the most numerous. Besides Dawn and the others, there were some unfamiliar young faces, presumably new stars recently cultivated.
They saw Li Ang; Dawn waved his hand as a greeting, while the unfamiliar new stars nodded cautiously and respectfully from a distance, with some even bowing formally, like newcomers meeting seniors for the first time in the Japan Islands workplace.
The people from European Heavy Industry showed few signs of battle. They had just begun climbing the tower not long ago, and like Li Ang, most opponents opted to surrender, which allowed them to ascend quickly.
However, there’s one difference—the participants from the European Heavy Industry were too many, having integrated the civilian Transcendents from Europe and the United States, and having acquired the organizations Prometheus and Gen-Sys Biotech Company, further inflating their number of Transcendents,
putting them at the forefront in terms of both quantity and quality among all global superhuman organizations.
In this Destiny Battle, as usual, the number of participants from the European Heavy Industry was high,
Being from the same organization, when they encountered each other in the Sky Arena, they either surrendered based on the internal training match results, with the weaker yielding to the stronger,
or they feigned combat, stopping just short, allowing the side with the advantage to advance.
"Doesn’t their approach seem somewhat pointless?"
Wang Congshan puckered her lips and said, "This Destiny Battle’s preliminary to semi-final rounds don’t rely solely on the number of layers in the Sky Arena. Players’ overall performance during the tower climb is also assessed.
Even if all of European Heavy Industry surrenders upon meeting, it won’t impact the final outcome.
Instead, malicious competition through surrenders might lead to sanctions from the Sky Arena—like facing extraordinarily powerful combat puppets or Transcendents from different worlds."
"Hmm... Their method, while ineffective in some ways, might have some slight utility,"
Li Ang pondered and said, "If they were ruthless enough to abandon pretense and willingly let go of some players who just reached Lv25 but have no real chance of advancing to the finals,
using them as tools for surrender.
As long as they encounter colleagues in the lower floors, they would proactively surrender, propelling the elite and mid-tier of European Heavy Industry upwards.
Simultaneously, they would deliberately stay on low floors to seriously battle players from other organizations of the same level, slowing their ascent.
If the lower floor is occupied by low-level players, then the middle tiers of the Sky Arena will have numerous strong players—they are bound to engage in exhausting conflicts.
Skill Scrolls would be depleted, equipment items would enter cooldowns, and Spiritual Energy recovery would take time.
This way, the ascent of most players is slowed, indirectly easing the burden on European Heavy Industry’s senior Transcendents."
"Oh, oh."
Wang Congshan nodded thoughtfully, "But doing so would certainly trigger backlash from other organizations, right?
European Heavy Industry can’t take all the benefits unless they want to see Transcendents from other organizations band together and deliberately pull out all stops when battling European Heavy Industry players."
"That’s why I said ’if,’"
Li Ang casually remarked, "Next, European Heavy Industry will likely meet with leaders of other guilds and organizations to negotiate, steering everyone back to normal competition.
Now, such minor tactics will only be employed on the first day."
————
Just as Li Ang predicted, as time progressed, the competition in the Sky Arena became increasingly fair, especially towards the end of the preliminary stage, where battles were fiercely contested.
Several renowned battles erupted, such as Selcius of the Bell Tower versus the Witch Alliance’s Dark Mother,
Both were undeniably high-level Spellcasters, far beyond the scope of simple "Big Fireball Technique" exchanges, showcasing the wisdom, cunning, and courage of Mages in their fight.
They employed Advanced Invisibility Technique and Teleportation Techniques to hide their positions,
used Mirror Technique and Fraud Technique to deceive one another,
set up multiple traps such as Anti-biology Field and Anti-magic Field on the narrow stage,
and utilized Precognition Technique to foretell future moves and cast spells accordingly,
intermingling deceit and counter-deceit—casting a special spell called "Trigger" upon themselves, which automatically activates another spell effect when the opponent makes corresponding actions.
The entire stage resembled an exhilarating spell extravaganza, with endless magic teleporting, flashing, and disappearing, dazzling the audience.
Then there was Dawn from European Heavy Industry versus Ding Zhensi from the Special Affairs Bureau.
Before the competition started, most people believed Dawn would win the match effortlessly.
Even though Ding Zhensi’s Kui Ox embodies the wisdom of the Special Affairs Bureau’s equipment research department, Dawn’s Capini is a creation indelibly crafted by European Heavy Industry at great expense.
Moreover, Dawn herself became a player earlier than Ding Zhensi, possessing greater individual power.
However, the competition process was quite unexpected,
Ding Zhensi’s Kui Ox Mecha developed new functions. Not only could it continue to activate the vector nozzle, launch rocket missiles, and wield the high-frequency cutting blade as before,
but it could also awaken the Will of Kui Ox within the mecha, allowing the will to connect heart-to-heart with the pilot.
The Shanhai Series Mecha was developed by the Special Affairs Bureau’s equipment development department by extracting fragments of ancient monster beast God Soul from the Demon Prison,
When the Will of Kui Ox was awakened, the mecha itself underwent significant mutations, emitting a continuous flow of intense primal monster aura, dramatically increasing its speed and combat instincts, even temporarily suppressing the firepower of the Capini Mech, dragging both sides into close combat.
It wasn’t until Dawn activated one of her trump cards—the A.T. Force Field she obtained from the Deep Sea Monster World—that she managed to subdue the Kui Ox Mecha, waiting for Ding Zhensi himself to succumb to the burden of the psychic link and leave the battle, thus claiming victory.
Overall, the preliminary stage of battles was thrilling, yet most spectators regretted not witnessing the deadly fights between real top-tier players.
Whether it was Michael, Lose Control, Cold Waterstone, Hoenhem, or Li Ang, they maintained a certain tacit understanding, avoiding showcasing their full power during the tower climbing process.
In the last Gate Rift competition, players from the Different World appeared, and this time in the Battle of Fate, transcendent beings from other worlds appeared even more frequently.
They saw no need to fight desperately so early, wasting their strength in vain.
At least in the preliminary stage, it wasn’t necessary.
Thus, the Battle of Fate’s preliminary stage came to a close, with a total of two thousand players advancing to the semifinals.
————
"Didn’t anticipate that the first floor of Sky Arena had the attribute of infinite capacity."
At this moment, it was already the second day of the semifinals stage of the Battle of Fate. Chaichai, holding a bucket of fried chicken and cola, sat in the corner of the spectators’ seats, marveling at the vast surrounding space.
Beside her sat Liu Wu Dai and Wang Congshan; Chaichai was not a player, Wang Congshan had just reached Lv20 not long ago, and out of the three, only Liu Wu Dai had registered for the Battle of Fate and advanced to the semifinals.
"The size of the first floor now can rival five of the largest stadiums in the real world, right? Nearly fifty thousand people are sitting on the first floor, most of whom are ordinary folks."
Chaichai said while gnawing on her fried chicken, "I wonder what they’re thinking, going through all this effort just to watch a game."
Liu Wu Dai glanced at her; the semifinals stage of the Battle of Fate also used Sky Arena as its platform,
The difference being that the 2000 contestants had to compete once a day for ten days, with the final qualifications determined by their average performance in these ten matches.
Furthermore, although the contestants were preparing for battle on the first floor platform, their real venue was the virtual space constructed by Sky Arena, not a physical ring.
All visitors on-site, whether players or ordinary people, could use their thoughts to direct the large screen to display the match they wanted to watch, without interfering with one another.
Meanwhile, those who didn’t attend the event had to rely on the live broadcast by the Watcher’s Guild.
"Ordinary people onsite are probably here seeking thrills."
Liu Wu Dai calmly stated, "People like this are quite common; for example, before the slaughter games, there were wealthy elites who raised dangerous pets like tigers and leopards or went to Africa with hunting rifles—a conventional form of entertainment in the real world doesn’t excite them, so they intentionally seek danger,
Yet they aren’t truly brave; whether raising tigers or hunting in Africa, they ensure their own safety first.
The same applies now—they rarely inject themselves with genetic elixirs to gain transcendent power, because doing so increases their chances of becoming players."
"Oh?"
Chaichai blinked in response, looking around to find many ordinary spectators dressed in luxurious clothing, seemingly wealthy or noble, accompanied by security guards.
"They even brought security teams?"
Chaichai grinned, turned, and asked Liu Wu Dai, "Hey, by the way, if those wealthy elites don’t dare inject themselves with genetic elixirs, how do they secure their wealth and status?
The forums are saying that having transcendent power is the real authority now?"
"Well... they have other ways."
Liu Wu Dai answered, "The saying that transcendent power is real authority primarily became popular around the time of the Gate Rift Battles.
That time was fairly chaotic.
Currently, these wealthy elite groups from the old world choose to rely on guild organizations like European Heavy Industry.
On one side, they provide massive financial and industrial support to European Heavy Industry, securing seats on the secondary board to ensure their safety,
On another, well, they’re prolific."
"Hm? Prolific?"
Chaichai blinked again, quickly realizing, "You mean, they’re crazily having children?"
"More or less."
Liu Wu Dai smiled, "Actually, the wealthy families of the old world were quite prolific originally, with lots of legitimate children and even more illegitimate ones. Previously, those illegitimate children were troublesome, just thrown some money once born to be sent away,
Now... the illegitimate sons have instead become family resources.
From what I know, those families of the Old World had already started their plans before the Gateway War,
secretly retrieving their illegitimate children, injecting them with Genetic Elixir, providing player qualifications, giving the best training, allowing these illegitimate children to rejoin the family.
"Hah, the feuds of the aristocracy."
Chaichai curled his lips, just a little thought with his brain, and he could understand the reasons behind those Old World families’ actions.
In the era of the Old World,
an individual or a family would frantically amass wealth, accumulate financial resources, possess power and status,
the ultimate goal was always to let the family continue on and maintain its glory,
thus there existed family businesses handed down through generations, continuously nurturing elites across various fields within the family, as well as numerous family charitable funds.
However, the competitive deathmatch game largely destroyed the old era "family-style" method of power inheritance.
Transcendent power is the true authority, even surpassing wealth established on the foundation of social order, as well as the order itself.
Since the original social order must concede in the face of transcendent power, then the money and power these families have accumulated is no longer secure,
the only way for the family to continue its rule,
is to transform family-style inheritance of wealth and power into family bloodline-style inheritance of transcendent power.
"The return of the illegitimate sons will also impact the original legitimate children. I’ve read reports that quite a few people died abroad because of this."
Wang Congshan took a chicken wing from Chaichai’s bucket and started eating, saying casually: "But they don’t seem to care much. As long as each generation of the family has powerful Transcendents emerging, the family can be passed down indefinitely.
Moreover, European Heavy Industry also acts as a kind of insurance—for those apex descendants of nobles who lack transcendent powers, it provides the best security treatment.
In some sense, they are the Celestial Dragons of the new era.
Oh, right,
sometimes those Old World families also take a marriage alliance approach, like having family children marry Transcendents with great potential.
Or, casting a wide net, they recruit young genius children from among the populace, easily brainwashed, bringing them into the family as adopted sons and daughters, providing them the best educational environment from a young age, hoping to nurture them into powerful Transcendents as well.
A noble family from England or France once adopted nearly two hundred gifted children at once, and they plan to adopt even more in the future.
It can only be said that nothing is new under the sun; the ancient tradition of adoption has returned."
Wang Congshan remarked with some disdain: "Of course, this is restricted to foreign countries only, as those Old World families cannot take genius children from us—the ones who dared to reach out have all been cut down."
The three of them chatted sporadically; over the past month, many significant events have unfolded in the world,
for instance, the war between European Heavy Industry and the military-industrial complex is becoming ever more intense, with both sides even deploying small tactical nuclear weapons to assassinate each other’s players and leaders.
Meanwhile, the wave of protests in the United States is gradually being quelled—the national guard and formal armies of the United States are suppressing the sporadic protests with military-grade weapons and equipment.
However, it seems that internal strife is also erupting among the high echelons of the United States—some decision-makers want to abandon certain low-end populations of the United States, while a small number of decision-makers with American conscience resolutely oppose it; it looks like there will be more turmoil.
Additionally, the Gru Department of Russia is working full force to develop the Alskalisan Star Gate World located in Siberia.
The Special Affairs Bureau and the Global Occult Coalition also have certain development rights to that Star Gate World, and through their efforts, the Gru Department has agreed to establish a "humanitarian aid zone" in the Star Gate World,
which means designating a piece of land on the planet for the refugees on Earth who have no Gateway World to migrate to.
Buzz——
The vibration of the communication watch interrupted the idle chat of the three,
"His match is about to start."
Chaichai, who was eating fried chicken, perked up, wiped his hands on a napkin, and quickly focused his mind on the big screen.
The familiar silhouette in the Dragon Head White Lab Coat immediately appeared at the center of the screen.
[Current round: Semifinal stage of the Battle of Life and Death, second match]
[Random mode selection in progress...]
[Mode selected, locked as Solo Deathmatch]
[Participants, AIM, Authentic Supermarket and Clinic...]
[Teleporting...]
