Chapter 1 Iron Scorpion Is Dead

[Authentic Good Supermarket Authentic Good Clinic, newly opened store in the southeast corner of the square... Wins]

Clear words appeared above the arena. Li Ang looked at the rapidly dissipating Iron Scorpion beneath his feet and shook his head with some boredom. He flicked his palm, causing the wooden characteristics on it to recede, restoring it to its human shape, before walking back towards the audience seats.

Seeing Li Ang frowning in thought, Wang Congshan assumed something was wrong and asked nervously, "What's wrong? Are you injured?"

"It's nothing."

Li Ang waved his hand. "I was just thinking about the Iron Scorpion's physiological structure. That creature is very... interesting. Maybe I can create something special and novel from it."

"Eh?"

Wang Congshan squinted at Li Ang. She had seen his so-called "inventions" since she was little.

The last time she heard that term, Li Ang claimed he had created a highly effective antihypertensive drug that not only controlled blood pressure and treated hypertension but also allowed you to touch high-voltage electricity without any issues.

The effect was so good that it could almost rank in the top twenty of Li Ang's small inventions list.

By the way, Li Ang's other inventions included, but were not limited to: a new type of mobile phone with a physical keyboard and replaceable battery;

an electricity generator powered by electricity;

genuine, honest, and truthfully advertised urinating meatballs;

a divine freckle cream that could turn zebras into white horses, spotted dogs into white dogs, and ordinary people could even use it to wash away corpse spots on their bodies if they applied it every day;

"It's true."

Li Ang recalled that the arena in Sky Arena had a function to actively clean up corpses.

After a player died, their corpse would instantly dissipate to prevent situations where players would use corpse explosion techniques on themselves, dying together with their opponents.

However, when Li Ang pierced through the Iron Scorpion with his wooden arm, he had already used a detection tool made of plant fibers to scan the internal structure of the Iron Scorpion.

"The main body of that creature is a humanoid embryo, hidden in the back of the Iron Scorpion, that has begun to take shape.

The embryo has already completed the differentiation of its head, face, neck, torso, and limbs.

Although the facial features have not yet fully developed, the actual age of its brain is over forty years old, and it is not a synthetic creature or anything like that."

Li Ang pondered and said slowly, "The Iron Scorpion's scorpion body is more like a giant incubator for storing this 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—the scorpion body—to fight.

The four half-mummified corpses on the Iron Scorpion's back act as auxiliary brains, helping the embryo better control the scorpion body of the Iron Scorpion.

In addition, the gene sequences of the four mummified corpses are extremely similar to those of 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 future evolutionary directions for humanity."

Li Ang said lightly, "Perhaps in a certain world line, the human civilization's living environment has deteriorated to an extreme degree.

Humans have no choice but to degrade themselves, placing themselves in replaceable, highly adaptable, enhanced vehicles.

They also incorporate their dead relatives into external plug-in bodies, to act as auxiliary brains."

Wang Congshan imagined it and said hesitantly, "Really? That's... kind of weird."

"Who knows,"

Li Ang shrugged and said indifferently, "There are all kinds of strange things in this vast world. Maybe in some plane, there are man-eating hot dogs, or toothpicks that eat hot dogs."

During this period, Li Ang had been trying to place the terminal vending machine in new worlds. The strangeness of some of these planets greatly shattered Li Ang's original perception.

For example, there was a planet where gravity pointed towards the sky. All humanoid residents lived in rock layer cities. Their most dangerous natural disaster was earthquakes—plate movements would tear the rock layers apart, causing an entire city to be dragged by gravity and thrown into the sky.

There was also a planet of cat-dog wars—the old intelligent race on that planet died out in a worldwide genetic weapon war. The remaining genetically modified cats and dogs became the inheritors of civilization. They took up weapons, rebuilt factories, and divided the world in half, each occupying one side, driven by the hatred engraved in their genes, starting a tragic war between the two races that spanned thousands of years.

(By the way, the first to discover the terminal vending machine were pacifist cats and dogs who wandered around. They used the special agent suits given by Li Ang to successfully infiltrate the presidential offices of the two camps, brainwashing the top leaders of both sides, successfully stopping the millennia-long racial war, and focusing the attention of all animals on exploring the wider universe.

Li Ang also received the highest honor medal from the cat and dog planet—the Good Human Award)

There was even a hellish planet—the residents there were all dead spirits, and living people were more like terrifying urban legends. Even ghost mothers used to coax ghost children to sleep by saying, "If you don't sleep, be careful the living people will take you away."

Just like the item description said, the terminal vending machine's transmission targets were purely random, with a huge span between planets. It didn't seem as "purposeful" as the Killing Game script missions.

Li Ang sat there absentmindedly, waiting for the Colt revolver to reload. Before long, new players appeared on the twenty-eighth floor one after another.

The Death Serenade from the Evil Scientist Alliance,

Aim from the Special Incidents Division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation,

Daybreak, Agares, Zest Coalescence, etc., from the European Heavy Industries Group.

European Heavy Industries had the most transcendents. In addition to Daybreak and others, there were also some unfamiliar young faces, probably newly trained stars.

They saw Li Ang, and Daybreak waved his hand as a greeting. The unfamiliar newcomers nodded respectfully to Li Ang from afar. Some even bowed solemnly, like new employees in a Japanese workplace seeing their seniors for the first time.

The members of European Heavy Industries didn't seem to have many traces of battle on them. They had only recently started climbing the tower. Like Li Ang, most of the opponents they encountered chose to surrender, which was why they had risen so quickly.

However, there was one difference—European Heavy Industries had too many participants. They had already integrated civilian transcendents from Europe and the United States. After merging and acquiring Prometheus and Gen-Sys Biotechnology, the number of transcendents under their command had further expanded.

Both in terms of quantity and quality, they were at the forefront of all transcendent organizations in the world.

This time in the Siming Battle, European Heavy Industries had as many contestants as ever.

Because they were all from the same organization, when their members met in Sky Arena, they either directly surrendered to the stronger ones based on the results of the company's internal training matches,

or put on a show and fought for a while, stopping when appropriate, allowing the advantageous side to advance.

"Their approach is actually useless, right?"

Wang Congshan curled her lips and said, "The preliminary rounds to the semi-finals of this Siming Battle don't completely depend on the number of floors in Sky Arena. It also considers the overall performance of the players in the tower climbing process.

Even if everyone in European Heavy Industries meets and surrenders, it won't affect the final result.

On the contrary, because they all meet and surrender to each other, raising the number of floors and maliciously competing, they will be sanctioned by Sky Arena—for example, by arranging exceptionally powerful combat puppets for them, or transcendents from other worlds or something."

"Well... their approach is useless in some ways, and slightly useful in others."

Li Ang thought for a moment and said, "If they were ruthless and tore off their disguise, actively abandoning some players who had just reached Lv25 but had absolutely no hope of advancing to the finals,

and let them act as tools for surrendering.

As long as they met a colleague on a lower floor, they would actively surrender, sending all the strong and middle-level members of European Heavy Industries upstairs.

At the same time, they would deliberately stall on the lower floors, seriously fighting with players of the same level from other organizations, slowing down their rate of ascent.

And if the lower levels were occupied by low-level players, then there would be many powerful players in the middle levels of Sky Arena—they would definitely start fighting each other and consuming resources.

Skill scrolls would be consumed, equipment and props would enter cooldown, and spiritual energy would take time to recover.

In this way, the ascent speed of most players would be slowed down, and the burden on the senior transcendents of European Heavy Industries would be reduced indirectly."

"Oh, oh."

Wang Congshan nodded thoughtfully. "But doing so would definitely cause a backlash from other organizations, right?

Not all the benefits can be taken by European Heavy Industries, unless they want to see the transcendents of other organizations work together to deliberately take a hardline stance in battles with European Heavy Industries players."

"So, I said 'if'."

Li Ang said casually, "Next, European Heavy Industries will probably go find the heads of other organizations and guilds to meet and negotiate, so that everyone can return to normal competition.

This kind of petty trick will only be used on the first day."

————

As Li Ang predicted, in the following period, the competition in Sky Arena gradually became fairer, especially in the last few days of the preliminary stage, the battles became even more intense.

Dozens of classic battles broke out, such as Celsius of the Clock Tower versus the Dark Mother of the Witch Alliance.

Both were undoubtedly high-level casters, who had long since moved beyond the "Great Fireball" exchange, and the battles fully demonstrated the wisdom, cunning, and courage of mages.

They used advanced invisibility and teleportation to hide their positions,

used mirror images and deception to deceive each other,

laid multiple traps such as anti-biological force fields and anti-magic force fields on the narrow arena,

and used foresight to predict the future and release spells in a targeted manner.

There was also a mix of deception and counter-deception—the two would cast a special spell called "trigger" on themselves. When their opponent made a corresponding action towards them, the spell would automatically take effect and generate another spell effect.

The entire arena was like an extremely enthusiastic magic carnival, with countless spells traversing, teleporting, and disappearing within it, dazzling the eyes.

Another example was Daybreak of European Heavy Industries, facing Ding Zhensiji of the Special Affairs Bureau.

Originally, before the start of the match, the vast majority of people believed that Daybreak would win the match without any suspense.

Because although Ding Zhensiji's Kuiniu was the crystallization of the wisdom of the Special Affairs Bureau's equipment research and development department, Daybreak's Capaneus was an epic creation that European Heavy Industries had built up at all costs.

And Daybreak himself became a player earlier than Ding Zhensiji and possessed greater personal power.

But the process of the match was surprising.

Ding Zhensiji's Kuiniu mecha had developed new functions. Not only could it continue to activate vector nozzles, launch rocket missiles, and wield high-frequency cutting blades like before,

but it could also awaken the Kuiniu will carried inside the mecha, allowing the Kuiniu will to connect with the pilot's heart.

The Shanhai series mecha were originally developed by the Special Affairs Bureau's equipment research and development department by intercepting the remnant souls of ancient demons and beasts in the Prisoner Demon Cave.

When the Kuiniu will was awakened, the mecha itself underwent a significant transformation, emitting a steady stream of rich, wild demon energy, and its movement speed and combat instincts increased sharply, even suppressing the firepower of the Capaneus mecha in all aspects in a short period of time, dragging both sides into close combat.

It wasn't until Daybreak activated one of his trump cards—the A.T. Field he obtained from the Deep Sea Giant Beast world—that he managed to subdue the Kuiniu mecha. Only when Ding Zhensiji himself couldn't bear the burden of the mental link and withdrew from the battle did he achieve victory.

In general, the battles in the preliminary stage were already thrilling, but what disappointed the vast majority of spectators was that they still couldn't see a life-and-death battle between truly top-level players.

Whether it was Michael, Out of Control, Cold Stone, Hohenheim, or Li Ang, they all maintained a certain tacit understanding and didn't use their full strength in the process of climbing the tower.

In the last Doorway Contention, otherworldly players appeared. This time in the Siming Battle, otherworldly transcendents appeared even more frequently.

There was no need for them to fight to the death so early and waste their strength in vain.

At least there was no need for that in the preliminary stage.

Thus, the preliminary stage of the Siming Battle came to an end, and a total of two thousand winning players entered the semi-final stage.

————

"I didn't expect that the first floor of this Sky Arena also has the property of infinite capacity."

At this moment, it was already the second day of the semi-final stage of the Siming Battle. Chai Chai, holding a bucket of fried chicken and a cola, sat in a corner of the audience seats, looking around at the vast space, marveling in admiration.

Next to her sat Liu Wudai and Wang Congshan. Chai Chai wasn't a player, and Wang Congshan had only recently reached Lv20. Among the three, only Liu Wudai had signed up to participate in the Siming Battle and had advanced to the semi-finals.

"The scale of the first floor now is comparable to five of the largest stadiums in the real world, right? Nearly 500,000 people are sitting on the first floor, the vast majority of whom are ordinary people."

Chai Chai said while nibbling on the fried chicken, "I don't know what they're thinking, putting in so much effort just to watch the match."

Liu Wudai glanced at her. The semi-final stage of the Siming Battle also used Sky Arena as a platform.

The difference was that the 2,000 participants had to fight one match every day for ten days, and the final qualification for the finals would be determined based on the average performance of the ten matches.

Also, although the participants were all preparing to participate in the battle on the first floor platform, their real arena was the virtual space constructed by Sky Arena, not the arena.

All the spectators who came to the venue, whether players or ordinary people, could use their minds to have the big screen play the match they wanted to watch, and each person wouldn't interfere with the other.

And those who didn't come to the venue needed to rely on the Watchers Guild's live broadcast.

"Ordinary people who come to the venue should be looking for excitement."

Liu Wudai said calmly, "This kind of person is quite common. For example, before the Killing Game, there were wealthy and powerful people who raised dangerous pets like tigers and cheetahs, or went to Africa to hunt with rifles—the conventional entertainment methods of the real world couldn't stimulate them, so they deliberately sought danger on their own.

But they're not really brave. Whether it's raising tigers or going hunting in Africa, they have to ensure their own safety.

The same is true for these people now—they rarely inject themselves with gene drugs to give themselves extraordinary power, because that would increase the probability of them becoming players."

"Oh?"

Chai Chai blinked her eyes when she heard this and looked around. Sure enough, she found that many of the ordinary spectators present were dressed luxuriously, looked rich and powerful, and also had bodyguards around them.

"They even brought security teams?"

Chai Chai grinned and turned to ask Liu Wudai, "Hey, by the way, if those wealthy and powerful people don't dare to inject themselves with gene drugs, how do they ensure their wealth and status?

Doesn't the forum say that only extraordinary power is real power?"

"Well... they have other ways."

Liu Wudai said, "The saying that extraordinary power is real power mainly became popular around the time of the Doorway Contention.

That period was relatively chaotic.

Now, these wealthy and powerful groups from the old world choose to depend on guild organizations like European Heavy Industries.

On the one hand, they provide huge economic assistance and physical industrial assistance to European Heavy Industries to obtain seats on the European Heavy Industries Secondary Board of Directors to ensure their own safety,

and on the other hand, they're very fertile."

"Huh? Very fertile?"

Chai Chai blinked her eyes and immediately reacted, "You mean, they're frantically having children?"

"Almost."

Liu Wudai smiled slightly, "In fact, the wealthy families of the old world were originally very fertile. There were piles of legitimate children and even more illegitimate children. In the past, those illegitimate children were a nuisance. They would just give them some money when they were born and send them away.

Now... illegitimate children have become family resources instead.

As far as I know, those families in the old world began to make plans long before the Doorway Contention.

They secretly sought out their family's illegitimate children, injected them with gene drugs, provided them with player qualifications, and gave them the best training, allowing these illegitimate children to return to the family."

"Wow, a wealthy family feud."

Chai Chai curled her lips and, with a casual thought, understood the reasons why those families in the old world did this.

In the era of the old world,

an individual or a family frantically accumulated wealth, amassed wealth, and possessed power and status.

The ultimate goal was always to allow the family to continue and maintain its glory.

That's why there were family businesses passed down through generations, constantly cultivating elites in various fields within the family, and numerous family charitable foundations.

However, the Killing Game greatly destroyed the old era's "family-style" power inheritance method.

Extraordinary power was real power, even higher than wealth based on social order, or even the social order itself.

Since the original social order had to give way to extraordinary power, then the money and power accumulated by those families were no longer safe.

The only way to allow the family to continue its rule

was to transform the family-style inheritance of power and wealth into a family bloodline-style inheritance of extraordinary power.

"The return of illegitimate children will also have an impact on the original legitimate children. I've seen information before that many people have died abroad because of this."

Wang Congshan took a chicken wing from Chai Chai's fried chicken bucket and gnawed on it, saying casually, "But they don't seem to care very much. Anyway, as long as each generation in the family produces strong enough transcendents, the family can be passed down forever.

Furthermore, European Heavy Industries is also a kind of insurance in a sense—the existence of European Heavy Industries allows even the children of the top wealthy and powerful who don't have extraordinary power to receive the best security treatment.

In a sense, they are the celestial dragons of the new era.

Oh, right,

sometimes those old-era families also adopt the method of arranged marriages, such as marrying their family's children to transcendents with great potential.

Or they cast a wide net and catch many fish,

searching for talented children from the people who are young and easy to brainwash, and recruiting them into the family as adopted sons and daughters, giving them the best education environment from childhood, wanting to cultivate them into powerful transcendents as well.

A noble family in England or France adopted nearly two hundred talented children at once, and they will adopt even more in the future.

It can only be said that there is nothing new under the sun, and the ancient tradition of adoption has returned."

Wang Congshan said with some disdain, "Of course, this is limited to foreign countries. Those old-era families can't take away talented children from us—anyone who dares to reach out will be hacked to death."

The three of them chatted casually. Over the past month, many major events had occurred in the world again.

For example, the war between European Heavy Industries and the military-industrial complex had intensified, and both sides had even used small tactical nuclear weapons to snipe each other's players and leaders.

At the same time, the wave of protests in the United States had gradually subsided—the United States National Guard and regular army used military-grade weapons and equipment to suppress the protests that arose one after another.

However, infighting seemed to be breaking out among the top leaders of the United States—some decision-makers wanted to abandon some of the low-end population of the United States, while a small number of decision-makers with American conscience firmly opposed it, and it looked like it would continue to cause trouble for a while.

In addition, the Russian GRU department was fully developing the Alskalisan Stargate world located in Siberia.

The Special Affairs Bureau and the Global Supernatural Alliance also had certain development rights to that Stargate world. With the efforts of the two, the GRU department agreed to set up a "humanitarian aid zone" in the Stargate world,

that is, to designate an open space on the planet for refugees from Earth who had no Stargate world to migrate to.

Buzz—

The vibration of the communication watch interrupted the three's chat.

"His match is about to start."

Chai Chai, who was eating fried chicken, was jolted and wiped her hands on a napkin, quickly concentrating her will and focusing on the big screen.

That familiar figure in the dragon-head white coat immediately appeared in the center of the screen.

[Currently, it is the second match of the Siming Battle semi-final stage]

[Random mode is being selected...]

[Mode has been selected, locked as single deathmatch]

[Contestants, Aim, Authentic Good Supermarket Authentic Good Clinic...]

[Transferring...]