Chapter 367: Rugged Civilization |
The Green Mountain Civilization finally noticed that something was amiss internally.
But—
It was already too late!
A political home planet served as the absolute center of power for a civilization. For example, the political home planet of the Human Civilization was Water Blue Star. Originally, it had been the Stellar Train, but recently the administrative core had gradually shifted to Water Blue Star. With the planet taking on this responsibility, the train was free to spend more time engaging in external combat and expanding their territory.
He had not paid a visit to the Green Mountain Civilization's political home planet.
Those grand overlords were still living quite comfortably.
However...
The resources stockpiled on the commercial and military planets of the Green Mountain Civilization had already been looted clean. Their armies and trains had their time dimensions deleted by him. At this moment, the Green Mountain Civilization was little more than an empty shell.
They no longer had massive amounts of resources to deploy at will.
The Green Mountain Civilization was already completely hollowed out.
Even if they figured it out, it was meaningless.
It was time to pull in the net.
"..."
Chen Mang sat in his chair, quietly watching the high-level officials of the Green Mountain Civilization hold their emergency meetings. Since he had already been discovered, there was no longer any need to hide. Using the fastest and most brutally straightforward methods, he stripped all the stockpiled resources from every military planet in their final star system.
With that done!
Almost all the resources of the Green Mountain Civilization were now in his hands!
He acquired a total of 2,600 Background Units of iron ore, along with various other resources. As for Murphy Stones, he did not find a single one. The Green Mountain Civilization had stockpiled all their Murphy Stones on their political home planet under strict control, but that did not matter to him.
What followed was much simpler.
Chen Mang traveled through the Refrigerator and arrived near the political home planet of the Green Mountain Civilization. The intricate patterns along the barrel of the level 2000 Akhenaten Light Energy Main Cannon slowly began to charge. Consuming 700 trillion units of iron ore, he fired off seven shots at once.
There was no blinding flash of light.
There was no violent recoil.
A light, fluttering piece of paper, looking much like a supermarket receipt, drifted out from the muzzle and floated toward the political home planet.
At the same time.
The radars of the Green Mountain Civilization detected the incoming attack. Countless alarms blared. Every high-ranking official who received the warning instantly plunged into near-despairing terror. They only knew they had an enemy, but they had no idea who this enemy was or where they had come from.
Like an invisible ghost.
Gnawing away at them bit by bit.
There was no defense against the Two-Way Foil. At least, the Green Mountain Civilization had none.
Twenty-seven minutes after Chen Mang piloted the Stellar Train out of the sector.
In a silent explosion...
A blinding light, traveling far beyond the speed of light, rapidly enveloped the entire star system. This star system, which once housed the political home planet of the Green Mountain Civilization, rapidly collapsed in dimensionality under the attack.
Until...
It became a two-dimensional star system.
It transformed into a flat sheet of paper, permanently suspended in the vastness of the universe.
There were no casualties.
This dimensional reduction was just like extracting the time dimension. People did not die, nor would they be sent to the Second Universe. They were still alive, but they had become two-dimensional beings living in a two-dimensional world. They had no brainwave activity and could not move, perfectly frozen like characters in an oil painting.
"..."
Hovering directly above this two-dimensional star system, Chen Mang observed it with his own eyes. After a long while, he whispered, "It looks quite beautiful."
At this moment, the star system could only be properly viewed from directly above. If observed from the side, it appeared as nothing more than a single thin line.
But from directly above, one could see a painting.
An exquisite painting.
An incredibly massive painting.
If he could bring this painting back to the train, it would actually make a lovely decoration. It was just a bit too large in diameter—nearly a million light-years across. It probably would not fit inside the train.
Every planet looked like a dab of ink, vividly inlaid against a predominantly blue-black canvas.
The level-six Green Mountain Civilization was officially annihilated.
From beginning to end, he never even met face-to-face with the leaders of the Green Mountain Civilization, yet the war was already over. It was just that simple.
Combat between advanced civilizations was actually quite straightforward.
As long as you intruded into enemy territory and dropped a few Two-Way Foils, the war would be effortlessly resolved.
The next moment—
Several holographic panels slowly surfaced inside the train.
-
"Human Civilization has met the promotion requirements and will automatically advance."
"The range of this Ascension Ripple is one billion light-years."
"All biological entities within civilizations of level one and above will receive this Ascension Ripple in their own way."
"The propagation speed of the Ascension Ripple is the speed of light."
-
"The level-five Human Civilization has successfully advanced to a level-six civilization."
-
"A level-six civilization."
Chen Mang exhaled softly. Sitting in his chair, he lit a cigarette and patiently enjoyed this moment of relaxation, feeling as though he had just completed a major milestone.
The distance to becoming a level-nine civilization...
...seemed to be only a single step away.
But he knew better.
This supposed short distance was like a mountain that looked close but would run a horse to death before it could be reached. It was nowhere near as short as it seemed.
Frankly speaking, the territory of a level-six civilization was only so large, whereas a god-level civilization could partition the entire universe. The difference was not just significant—it was astronomical. He still had a very long road ahead before reaching a god-level civilization.
However...
He was getting closer.
There was no rush.
-
"Civilization Name: Human Civilization."
"Civilization Level: 6."
"Civilization Leader: Chen Mang."
"Civilization Planets: Water Blue Star, Xuanwu Star, Mining Star No. 1, Mining Star No. 2, Mining Star No. 3, Mining Star No. 4, etc."
"Civilization Population: 59 trillion."
"Promotion Requirements: Peak attack energy output exceeding 300,000, possession of three Civilization Wonders, and a territorial expanse reaching 100 million light-years."
"PS: Advancing to a level-two civilization and every promotion thereafter will release an Ascension Ripple that can be detected by all surrounding civilizations. The higher the level, the wider the range of the released Ascension Ripple."
"Civilization Ability: Murphy Stone mines will naturally spawn within the civilization's territory."
-
The ability of a level-six civilization was extremely straightforward.
It helped the civilization acquire more Murphy Stones.
Theoretically speaking...
The larger the territorial expanse, the more Murphy Stone mines would spawn.
For example...
If the Dead End Star System had once been within the territory of the Green Mountain Civilization, there would have been a chance for Murphy Stone mines to spawn there. But since it wasn't, there was no chance for them to appear.
It was a rather basic civilization ability.
Judging solely on civilization abilities, this level-six perk was quite ordinary. It was not even as good as the level-five ability.
The level-five civilization ability had saved him a massive amount of resources.
"The resource consumption for upgrading all train components within the civilization is halved. Murphy Stone consumption remains unchanged. Defensive components such as Armor and Energy Shields are excluded."
This ability...
"Wait."
Chen Mang suddenly furrowed his brows. He had been so busy these past few days that he had completely forgotten about this. It was only now that he realized something—when he had been upgrading components recently, the resource consumption had not actually been halved.
For instance, he had just spent 5 Background Units of iron ore to upgrade the Train Auxiliary AI from level 2000 to level 5000. That was the base cost of the upgrade. If it had been halved, it should have only cost 2.5 Background Units of iron ore, right?
But soon—
He spotted a small red dot on the train's control console interface. Upon tapping it, a new holographic panel popped up.
"Hidden Reserve Resources: 4.127 Background Units of iron ore currently stored."
"Can be withdrawn at any time."
"So that's how it works..."
Chen Mang nodded thoughtfully. It seemed that this resource-halving effect did not directly reduce the cost during the upgrade process. Instead, one had to expend 100% of the required resources upfront, and then half of that amount would be refunded.
It sounded like a distinction without a difference, but there was actually a catch.
This meant he first needed to possess the full amount of resources to afford the upgrade before he could get the refund. It prevented him from taking shortcuts and upgrading a component when he did not actually have the total upfront capital.
The war with the Green Mountain Civilization had come to a definitive end.
Next came the cleanup phase.
The Stellar Train began rushing continuously between the other six star systems of the Green Mountain Civilization. It absorbed all the data from various military bases into the train's AI database and stuffed entire, intact resource planets directly into the train's storage.
For the resource planets that were less intact, he dispatched massive swarms of mining robots to rapidly strip-mine them. Any meager resources stockpiled on other celestial bodies, such as sentinel planets, were completely swept away as well.
Even the smallest scraps were still meat on the bone.
If he wanted to acquire these scrap resources through proper mining, it would have taken an incredibly long time.
The cleanup phase was quite time-consuming.
A full month passed.
Only then did Chen Mang thoroughly finish sweeping through the Green Mountain Civilization. In the future, these six star systems might splinter apart and form six lower-level civilizations, slowly clawing their way back to survival and development in the universe. But none of that had anything to do with him anymore. The evolution of a civilization was not something that could be completed in mere months.
Without tens of thousands of years, they wouldn't be able to develop anything decent.
And with that.
It was completely over.
This war was entirely concluded.
After deducting all expenditures, he netted a total of 2,872 Background Units of iron ore!
One Background Unit was equivalent to 10,000 trillion standard units of iron ore!
Just a single Background Unit of iron ore was nearly equal to the total combined resources of the Extreme Evil Civilization.
Wiping out the Green Mountain Civilization was the equivalent of wiping out 2,872 Extreme Evil Civilizations.
It was like killing 2,872 Satans.
Satan had truly been too poor.
What a waste of such an intimidating name.
Sitting inside the train's control room, Chen Mang tallied up his spoils while looking at the requirements for advancing to a level-seven civilization.
-
"Promotion Requirements: Peak attack energy output exceeding 300,000, possession of three Civilization Wonders, and a territorial expanse reaching 100 million light-years."
-
Peak attack energy output exceeding 300,000.
That was simple.
That just meant upgrading the Akhenaten Light Energy Main Cannon to level 3000. In fact, even hitting level 5000 would be a breeze. There was no difficulty at all, especially since his current status could be summed up in one word: Rich!
Possessing three Civilization Wonders was a bit more challenging.
He currently only had two Civilization Wonders: Zerg's Silence and Divine Silence.
Although the Dead End Star System had been flattened into a sheet of paper by the Green Mountain Civilization's Two-Way Foil, the Civilization Wonders still remained. Civilization Wonders were absolutely indestructible and immune to dimensional reduction.
It was just that...
There were no specific criteria for acquiring a Civilization Wonder. It depended entirely on luck and random chance. He had no idea when he would stumble upon a third one.
As for the requirement of a territorial expanse reaching 100 million light-years...
That was not too difficult.
Territorial borders could be drawn arbitrarily. He could claim as much space as he wanted, so long as he ensured there were no civilizations of a higher or equal level within those boundaries.
As long as he wiped out the level-seven civilization in this sector, this region's territory would become his.
In other words.
If he wanted to advance to a level-seven civilization...
He needed to exterminate this level-seven civilization first, and then... figure out a way to acquire another Civilization Wonder.
"Phew..."
Chen Mang sighed helplessly. He didn't know how the progression paths of other civilizations worked, but his own journey of civilization advancement lacked any battles against peers of the same level. It had been nothing but fighting above his weight class.
A level-four civilization fighting a level-five civilization. A level-five fighting a level-six. He had finally clawed his way up to level-six, and now it was time to fight a level-seven civilization.
Was it like this for other civilizations too?
The level-seven civilization dominating this area was known as the Rugged Civilization.
Judging by the name, the development path of this civilization sounded like it had been exceedingly rough and bumpy.
During this time, Xiao Ai had been continuously collecting the dead databases of all AIs within a 100-million-light-year radius, successfully gleaning some information about this Rugged Civilization.
"Captain."
Xiao Ai's voice echoed through the train.
"Using the database from the Green Mountain Civilization and the other data modules I've gathered recently, I've compiled a report on the known information regarding the Rugged Civilization."
"This is a civilization ruled by the Star Arrow Clan."
"Their civilization structure does not follow the Train Civilization Format. Although they possess a small number of trains and components as auxiliary tools, their overall structure belongs to a Body Tempering Civilization. Much like a Cultivation Civilization, they rely primarily on their own physical strength."
"They concentrate immense cosmic power into their own bodies for combat."
"A casual strike from their strongest experts can shatter entire star systems."
"Their strength is exceptionally formidable."
"Oh?"
Chen Mang's expression gradually turned peculiar. The Star Arrow Clan sounded like a very niche race that very few people would have ever heard of, but as it turned out, he was one of them.
Coincidentally...
A few days ago, by consuming a slice of 500-Level Bread, the random racial talent he acquired just so happened to be the racial talent of the Star Arrow Clan, granting him top-tier archery skills.
It was just that this talent had never been of any use to him.
"So the people of this race rely entirely on bows and arrows as their primary method of combat?"
"No."
Xiao Ai's voice slowly resonated through the train cabin.
"This race is rather unique. Everyone is one of God's Chosen. They use their innate abilities to undergo a class transition. There are two transition paths: Berserker and Divine Archer."
"A very long time ago, the numbers of these two God's Chosen classes were roughly equal."
"But starting from an unknown point in time..."
"The number of Divine Archers in the Rugged Civilization began to drop rapidly. They stopped birthing this specific type of God's Chosen altogether. Up until now, the position of Holy Arrow in the Rugged Civilization has even been completely vacant."
"No one holds the title of Holy Arrow."
"The consensus of this civilization has always been that the strongest Divine Archer—the Holy Arrow—acts as their leader, guiding the entire civilization forward. Ever since the position of Holy Arrow became vacant, the civilization has been left in a leaderless state. They barely manage to issue orders through the Elder Council, but they are entirely disunited."
"This is the only reason the Green Mountain Civilization managed to survive."
"Otherwise..."
"The Green Mountain Civilization would have been annihilated long ago. A level-six civilization poses far too great a threat to the Rugged Civilization."
"And according to the Green Mountain Civilization's database, a long time ago, they secretly executed a top-secret initiative known as the 'God-Slaying Plan'."