Chapter 1243: Chapter 645: Withering the World Tree? (Part 2)
"Breaking the cauldrons and sinking the boats, huh." Ji Chaoyang said softly.
Yes, breaking the cauldrons and sinking the boats.
Xu Xin nodded, feeling a bit mentally exhausted.
If the alien invaders launched a full-scale offensive, they would definitely not stop until they had wiped them out.
If they adopted this method, it would mean directly escalating the conflict to an irreconcilable level and launching the final decisive battle.
Either succeed, or die.
But...
Xu Xin looked out the window.
A scene of thriving vitality.
The survivors and the people from the underground human base lived here very happily; it could be said that this World Tree had already become their home.
Given the current situation, since the alien invaders had no intention of attacking them, the safest course of action should be to develop their self‑defense capabilities while guarding this haven of theirs.
Because if they did not adopt a "backdoor" strategy, they absolutely could not possibly clash head‑on with the alien invaders.
Right now, aside from the handheld small arms, the rest of their weapons technology was not even on par with human weapons from a thousand years ago.
The only high‑tech weapons they had were in the bracelet Xu Ying had given him, and there were not many of those; in a frontal confrontation, they would not be decisive. Moreover, once they were used, Xu Ying would also be erased by the world.
They must not be used unless there was truly no other choice.
And this time, the monster had not brought any weapons with it either.
When it left that timeline, its brain had still been in a muddled state, so there was no way it could have had any weapons in its hands.
After coming to this world, although its brain state had stabilized, because of its identity, the alien invaders would naturally never give it high‑tech weapons.
Compared to the alien invaders, their combat power was still far too weak.
"Using this World Tree as bait—isn’t that a bit too dangerous?" Qi Xuefei voiced her thoughts. "In the future this place is bound to take in more and more people. Using it as bait... can the World Tree really hold out?"
Ji Chaoyang looked over at Xu Ying, who was sprawled on the sofa in a bit of a daze, and asked, "Xu Ying, I have a question. Can the World Tree actually be destroyed or not?"
Xu Ying straightened up from the sofa and said, "They now already possess the capability to destroy the World Tree."
Xu Ying’s words made everyone present, except for Xu Xin and Shi Wanyun, change their expressions.
"Last time, didn’t Shi Wanyun receive that kind of drug that can be injected into the World Tree?" Xu Ying glanced at Shi Wanyun as she spoke.
"That drug is with me." Xu Xin took out the vial.
All of them had already seen this drug before.
"Didn’t you say this kind of drug is useless against a fully mature World Tree?" Li Wenxi asked in confusion.
"If a large amount of a concentrated version of this drug is injected into the World Tree, it still has a certain effect." Xu Ying took the vial, held it up in front of her eyes, and said, "Its effect is—its effect is to make the above‑ground, plant portion of the World Tree rapidly wither and collapse in a short time."
"What?!"
"It can make the World Tree wither directly?!"
Xu Xin’s eyelids lowered slightly.
When he’d heard the monster tell them this information, his heart had jumped into his throat as well, and he’d immediately felt that even this World Tree was no longer secure.
Fortunately...
"I’ve said it before, the World Tree’s vitality is extremely tenacious. Its roots extend across a radius of several hundred kilometers. Unless this entire area is completely destroyed at the same time, the World Tree cannot die."
Xu Ying put the vial in her hand down on the table and spoke to the others.
"So this drug still cannot kill the World Tree, because it cannot destroy such an immense root system. What it does is make it so that, after withering, the World Tree cannot grow back and recover for a period of time."
"How long?" Zeng Tao asked curiously.
"The length of time isn’t the important part." Ji Chaoyang looked at the vial of drug on the table. "As long as the World Tree withers, the people living inside it will have to be exposed to sunlight."
Yes. That was what truly mattered.
Even if the World Tree were destroyed for just one second and then grew back, it still wouldn’t do.
"Then... why didn’t they do that before?" Zhao Xiaochuan asked.
"Because this drug is not that easy to manufacture." Xu Ying explained, "You need to concentrate the drug we have in front of us by over a hundredfold, and you need at least hundreds of liters of it, injected into the trunk of the World Tree in a short time. Only then can its destructive speed outpace the World Tree’s self‑healing speed and make it wither quickly."
"And a concentrated version of the drug, because of its unstable properties, cannot be stored for long." Xu Xin picked up the explanation and continued, "Previously, although the alien invaders had invented this drug, they had no enemies, not even hypothetical ones, so they naturally wouldn’t keep this kind of unstable substance on hand."
"Moreover, this substance is actually extracted from crimson crystals. To produce it, they have to consume their Source of Life, so of course they wouldn’t run many experiments with it."
"Oh... so the substance in the crimson crystals suppresses and destroys a World Tree whose core is a milky‑white crystal, hmm." Qin Fu muttered to himself.
"In any case, they already possess the ability to damage the World Tree and threaten our survival." Xu Xin tapped the table with his finger. "Even though they currently have no intention of attacking us, we still have to stay on high alert."
"You’re worried they’ll sneak over and give our World Tree a jab? That’s impossible, right? At the very least we’d definitely notice in advance." Lou Fei’Er, however, had great confidence in the World Tree. She arched her delicate brows and said, "Don’t forget what’s special about our World Tree."
