Safe City Ch.169

Chapter 169: [Answer]

That “Woohoo!” had been completely spontaneous.

It was almost like one of those bizarre Blue Sea rules: whenever a large number of Blue Sea residents gathered together and were about to enter battle, there was a ninety-percent chance that someone would start a collective “Woohoo!”

After shouting it, quite a few residents regretted it.

The shout itself wasn’t particularly loud when divided among everyone. The problem was that they were far too synchronized. Nearly everyone shouted at exactly the same time, making it remarkably conspicuous even on a battlefield filled with explosions and gunfire.

But they were still pretending to be [Company] employees!

Fortunately, the warm divine blessing that came from their God soon settled everyone down.

Cheng Qisheng had given them a mass blessing.

The residents who had been sent out had already successfully increased their strength. Now, not only had the strength of Blue Sea’s residents improved, but Blue Sea had also acquired a considerable number of weapons from various sources.

Blue Sea no longer needed to be as cautious as when they had first arrived on Moon Silk Star, constantly worrying about accidentally exposing themselves.

Old Eighth liked shouting “Woohoo”?

Then woohoo it was.

The Blue Sea residents received the divine oracle.

The oracle told them to relax and let themselves loose. There was no need to hold back or be so timid anymore.

They had only one mission from here on out:

End the battle as quickly as possible.

—If our God says it’s fine, then it must be fine!

The Blue Sea residents, who had constantly reminded themselves that they were undercover and shouldn’t reveal too much about themselves, suddenly looked at the battlefield differently.

Lord Gong Changming of Nightgreen Oasis watched helplessly as, after their collective shout, these people who had suddenly appeared out of nowhere—and who, for some inexplicable reason, knew her son—suddenly experienced a massive surge in combat strength across the board.

One of them charged straight toward the muzzle of a cannon as though he had no fear of death whatsoever. Under the enemy gunner’s horrified gaze, he suddenly launched himself forward.

And the crucial part was—

He actually made it.

After all, who could have imagined that someone would charge straight at the muzzle of a cannon capable of firing shells that could instantly melt through five meters of steel, completely ignore the weapon in his own hands, and instead rely solely on his own body to block the barrel?

On the left, another person descended from the sky, four wings spread behind him, a rapid-fire gun in his hands as he provided aerial fire support.

The important thing was that there were their own people down there too.

The people providing fire support from above weren’t the least bit worried about hitting their allies.

And the people fighting on the ground weren’t the least bit worried about being hit by friendly fire.

The two sides were operating on one thing above all else:

Trust.

—Whoosh!!!

Something flew past from the side, accompanied by a sharp whistle as it tore through the air.

It flew almost right past Gong Changming’s ear. Even though it had passed a considerable distance away from her, the veteran lord instinctively took a step backward, trying to avoid the passing attack as much as possible.

‘Probably ammunition?’

Gong Changming turned to look behind her.

Even when she had watched countless Blue Sea residents suddenly appear out of nowhere, she had managed to maintain a calm expression.

But now, that expression finally changed.

It was…

a stick.

The material was evidently quite good. It was extremely hard while still possessing a certain amount of flexibility, and its entire body was silver-white. It looked almost like some precious artifact taken straight from a historical museum built by the Old Humans.

But no matter how beautiful it looked—

It was still a spear.

There was no bomb attached to it. The tip wasn’t going to explode on its own.

It was simply a spear that had been driven straight into an enemy soldier who was holding a fire-flint cannon.

The enemy soldier was clearly a mutant, his body covered in a thick layer of scales.

Even so, those scales hadn’t been enough to stop an attack from a simple cold weapon on this battlefield where advanced firearms were flying everywhere.

Was this normal?

Was this even right?

Everyone knew that the reason the New Humans had been steadily driven back in their confrontations with the Old Humans, eventually having to surrender the richer and more resource-abundant regions to those [Companies] that had only recently awakened, was because the Old Humans possessed vast quantities of modern firearms.

And these damn people…

Many New Human lords had speculated that, before going into hibernation, the Old Humans had already known that radiation would cause mutations in plants and animals, and that these mutations would eventually become a threat to all of humanity.

After all, with the technology available at the time, this was something they could have predicted.

Yet those Old Humans had not only buried vast quantities of weapons from the Old Era inside underground shelters—they had even destroyed all knowledge of weapons manufacturing before going into hibernation.

More than a hundred years later, the New Humans had gradually adapted to this world at the cost of shortened lifespans, generation by generation. Among them, there were even geniuses who managed to develop some firearms based on fragmentary books and information left behind from the Old Era.

And then, precisely at that moment, the Old Humans who had abandoned them back then awakened carrying vast quantities of firearms.

Why else could the [Companies] occupy the best territories and monopolize nearly every technology available for sale?

Wasn’t it because they possessed vast quantities of firearms?

They refused to allow other factions to develop practical technologies on their own. Whenever a genius emerged within a New Human faction, the [Company] would send people to demand that the genius be handed over, like a mutant beast with the keenest ears and eyes.

If the New Human faction refused, they would concentrate their forces and wipe out the entire faction.

In the face of the [Companies], which possessed vast amounts of Old Era technology and weaponry, the New Human factions were simply incapable of resisting. Even the strongest mutants couldn’t withstand five days and five nights of continuous bombardment.

The New Human factions could only retreat again and again. In order to preserve themselves, they stopped developing and researching various technologies, ultimately becoming the “savages” that the [Companies] called them.

But now—

What was Gong Changming seeing?

She was seeing “mutants” actually gaining the upper hand on the battlefield while facing overwhelming firepower.

Yes, these mutants had weapons in their hands.

But some of them weren’t using weapons at all.

Relying solely on their formidable physical abilities and their almost supernatural speed, they could close the distance and twist an enemy’s neck before the enemy even had time to react.

Good heavens!

That one had even twisted the enemy’s neck with one hand.

—Cheng Qisheng was watching the battle as well.

Actually, when she had used the Truth Stone to ask whether it was better to develop extraordinary residents or to possess a large stockpile of weapons, she had already had a vague idea of the answer.

She simply needed to use that answer to obtain more detailed information about how a Safe City should develop.

And now, before the Truth Stone had even returned with its answer, Old Eighth had already confirmed her theory.

Most of these more than ten thousand Blue Sea residents had had combat strengths of around 75–90 when they left the Safe City.

Quite a few of the ability users among them had been at the first or second tier.

But after leaving the Broken River Wasteland, they had either traveled with their groups or ventured out on their own, killing mutant beasts and absorbing the nuclear crystals inside their brains.

Now, Tiers 3 and 4 had become the standard levels for supernatural Blue Sea residents, and there were even a few who had just advanced to Tier 5.

Once they entered the battlefield, the situation became almost completely one-sided.

The cannons in the enemy’s hands really were tremendously powerful.

But what good was a cannon if someone could silently sneak around behind you and snap your neck with one hand?

That cannon, capable of inflicting devastating damage, could instantly go from being an enemy weapon to becoming a Blue Sea weapon.

The lightning-type ability user Mo Yuxuan, who had already advanced to Tier 6, wasn’t here.

If she were, she could even precisely call down lightning onto the enemy’s weapons, giving the Blue Sea residents roughly two or three seconds—the amount of time it would take for the enemy soldiers to instinctively throw their weapons away.

That was the power of the supernatural ability user.

Weapons would ultimately have to be held by people.

Extraordinary powers, on the other hand, existed within the human body itself.

Of course, that was how things stood in theory.

In practice, Cheng Qisheng wasn’t about to pass up any opportunity to fill Blue Sea’s arsenal.

Especially [Heaven’s Punishment].

She had to get at least one.

With that thought, Cheng Qisheng kept part of her mental power focused on the battlefield, constantly bestowing blessings upon her believers and doing her best to relieve their fatigue.

The enemy troops were visibly losing steam, and some had already started trying to flee. But the Old Eighths were quick enough to catch them and drag them back.

Seeing that the battle was nearly over, Cheng Qisheng used another portion of her mental power to tap the Truth Stone.

“Hasn’t the answer been sent back yet?”

Old Eighth and the others were practically done with an entire battle. How was there still no response from the Truth Stone?

The Truth Stone immediately projected an image.

The people appearing in the scene this time probably didn’t know how the Truth Stone worked. They looked like ordinary passersby. A bearded man was walking along while lecturing a younger man who also had facial hair.

“We’re family. When your aunt comes to buy something from you, of course you have to give it to her at cost. And you should make sure she gets more than her money’s worth. Do you know how much your aunt helped our family when you were little…?”

Cheng Qisheng was gradually figuring out how to communicate with the Truth Stone.

“So you’re saying you’re trying to make the answer as valuable as possible within the limits of the rules?”

The Truth Stone immediately brought out the same “The orcs are shouting, ‘That’s right! That’s right!’” reaction image it had used before.

Seeing the meme made Cheng Qisheng want to laugh. She reached over and patted the Truth Stone on the head.

“Okay. I believe you’ll definitely make it worth my while. I’ll leave it to you.”

The Truth Stone immediately started playing another clip.

“Ah~ I would gladly offer you everything I have~”

“Ah~ I shall follow you for all eternity~”

Cheng Qisheng: “…”

It was pretty obvious that the “orcs shouting” clip and the footage of someone performing some kind of ritual while singing hymns would become the Truth Stone’s favorite reaction memes for a very long time to come.

The singing was admittedly a little unpleasant, but Cheng Qisheng was still in a very good mood.

There was a world of difference between winning over a subordinate through intimidation, forcing them to work for you, and winning over a subordinate through ability and mutual benefit, so that they actively thought about how they could help you every single day.

The Truth Stone, serving as the platform, was doing its best to make sure she got more than her money’s worth.

Now, Cheng Qisheng was beginning to look forward to seeing what this [answer] would actually turn out to be.

—

Inside a Tier 9 Safe City drifting through the vast universe—

“…The essence of supernatural abilities is a resonance-based interference system generated between the biological field of intelligent life and the laws of the universe. Through quantifying energy levels, standardizing defects, utilizing energy restraints, and so on, sustained advancement through the tiers can be achieved…”

The lord of the Safe City, A Chengduo, was writing furiously.

The last time she had worked this hard on a piece of writing was more than a thousand years ago, back when her native civilization had yet to be destroyed.

At the time, A Chengduo had simply been an ordinary student who had just finished writing her graduation thesis.

Then the apocalypse came.

It was a pain that would remain in her heart forever.

Afterward, she became a Safe City lord. Over the course of a thousand years of ups and downs, she had survived countless dangers, made friends with other Safe Cities, and made enemies of others as well.

And now, she had finally succeeded in upgrading her Safe City to Tier 9.

A thousand years had passed, and A Chengduo had never imagined that she would one day be writing a thesis again.

But being able to earn nine million nuclear crystals just by writing something was an temptation even a Tier 9 city lord couldn’t resist.

High-tier city lords were all poor.

That was common knowledge.

Compared with low-tier city lords, who still tended to have some habit of saving money, high-tier city lords understood better that, while wandering through this never-ending apocalyptic world, there was little use in keeping nuclear crystals sitting in their hands.

Aside from whatever emergency reserves they needed, the rest should be spent as soon as they earned it.

They could invest it in the construction of their Safe City or use it to help their extraordinary residents advance through the tiers. What mattered most was increasing their own strength.

If they didn’t spend it now, then once another Safe City defeated them in the future, were they supposed to let the other city lord spend it for them?

If you had one hundred thousand nuclear crystals, spend ninety thousand.

If you had one hundred million, spend ninety million.

Every high-tier city lord would never pass up an opportunity to either spend nuclear crystals or earn them.

So when the power of the Truth Stone reached across the vast universe and found her, A Chengduo smoothly accepted this windfall of an opportunity to make some nuclear crystals.

Nine million nuclear crystals was no small sum, even for a Tier 9 city lord.

Most importantly, she had just finished renovating her entire Safe City. The only nuclear crystals left in her warehouse were the ones reserved for traveling through the vast universe.

A Chengduo knew about the Truth Stone, but she couldn’t afford to buy one, and she had never happened to encounter one either.

Who would have thought that the first time she met this stone would be as an [Answerer]?

After taking a short break, A Chengduo continued hammering away at the virtual screen with her eighteen tentacles.

“…Under certain circumstances, firearms can indeed offset the inherent advantages of ability users through industrial production capacity and the scale of their energy output. However, we must take differences in tier into consideration…”

“…Certain apocalyptic worlds possess their own unique laws. Many worlds have environmental fields. Once the planetary critical gravitational sphere is crossed, matter will be captured and disintegrated, and this naturally includes firearms. Intelligent life, however, is unaffected. Therefore, we can establish that…”

An hour later, A Chengduo lowered her tentacles.

“Done!”

Full of anticipation, she submitted the [Answer] to the red mist hovering in front of her.

The red mist circled once, then floated motionlessly in midair.

A Chengduo had already checked what this meant.

The [Answer] wasn’t sufficient.

“Still not enough?!”

A Chengduo used one of her tentacles to scratch at the tusk on her forehead, trying to reason with the Truth Stone.

“This is the twelfth version already! It would’ve been more than sufficient as a thesis back in my native civilization! How much more detailed do you want it to be?!”

The red mist remained completely motionless, looking exactly like an honest information platform with no mind of its own, only instinct and rules.

A Chengduo: “…”

She silently chanted to herself:

‘Nine million nuclear crystals. Nine million nuclear crystals. Nine million nuclear crystals!’

A Chengduo tightly shut all 303 of her eyes, then opened them again and began racking her brain.

She went back through the hundreds of pages of her paper, [On Whether Firearms or Supernatural Strength Is More Important Under the Rules of Safe Cities], revising, expanding, and filling in more detailed material.

Damn it!

Those city lords who had once complained in the group chat that the Truth Stone charged too much for asking questions deserved to be hanged by a sea serpent!

Did those [Questioners] have any idea how many tentacles an [Answerer] had to wear out, or how many eyeballs they had to lose, just to answer a question?

A Chengduo cursed as she wrote. Her eighteen thick tentacles moved so fast they almost became afterimages, while more than a hundred smaller tentacles worked on revising and correcting the text.

That day, the lights in the room of the great Tier 9 City Lord A Chengduo stayed on all night.

…

Meanwhile, on Cheng Qisheng’s side, she watched as Old Eighth and the others led the Nightgreen Oasis army in repelling the attackers and successfully protected Lord Gong’s territory.

Then she ate a meal, slept for a while, and finally received the [Answer] from the Truth Stone.

Cheng Qisheng looked at the densely packed information layered across the surface of the Truth Stone, now finally appearing before her.

The Great Creator God of Blue Sea looked through the contents and made a rough estimate of how many words there were.

She confirmed it.

If these [Answers] had been printed on paper, they would have taken at least a thousand pages.

How was this an [Answer]?

This was basically an entire book.

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