The moment the soldiers tried to chase them off, the Captain of the Imperial Martial Regiment merely laughed. His voice was dripping with contempt. "If you want to die early, stay where you are. I'll give you three seconds. If you're still here after that, I'll kill you myself."
With a weapon capable of killing even a cosmic-rank powerhouse in his hands, he felt no fear at all. His eyes glimmered with amusement, as if he were playing with insects rather than facing opponents. The power gap between the sides was enormous, yet with such a weapon, a single sweep was enough to erase dozens of ninth-rank star-level fighters.
"How dare you! I refuse to believe you can cover the sky with one hand," Qiu Yu roared. Fury burned in his chest as he secretly used voice transmission to order his people into countless smaller teams to scatter and attack from different angles.
He also commanded the psychic ability users among them to immediately strike with mental force and eliminate this arrogant target before he could react.
At the same time, far away in the northwestern region, the Imperial Martial Regiment was waging a brutal hunt against all other factions that had managed to obtain pieces of the mineral ore.
Both North Dragon City and Black Cloud Mountain were now prey under the Regiment's relentless pursuit.
With weapons capable of killing cosmic-rank beings, the Imperial Martial Regiment swept aside everything in their path. Led personally by the Ninth Princess, their ten thousand-man unit found it almost laughably easy to kill the forces in their way.
Here, within this region, the Imperial Martial Regiment saw itself as the heavens. With the overwhelming advantage of their weapons, they acted without restraint.
Slaughter was one-sided.
The two major factions had no means to resist the destructive firepower. All they could do was split into multiple groups and scatter in hopes of surviving.
Yet the ore they carried was exactly what the Ninth Princess needed. There was no chance she would let them slip away.
The hunt continued, and already more than three thousand had been killed. From their storage devices alone, she had gathered over a million units of boundary ore. Combined with her own stock, she now had enough to exchange for the first cipher of the Inheritance Crystal.
The crystal sphere required three layers of password.
Each layer required ten million units of boundary ore.
After her forces wiped out another group and collected an additional two hundred thousand units, the Ninth Princess finally felt satisfied. She was now significantly closer to the first cipher.
"Still no contact with Ghost?" she asked coldly.
She had sent one of her squads, led by Ghost, to the Wind-Thunder Gorge, where the entrance to the Inner World awaited its opening.
She meant for him to lead his team elsewhere to hunt, but until now there had been no communication at all.
Just then, one of her soldiers rushed in breathlessly.
"Your Highness, we found Lord Ghost's remains not far from the entrance to the Inner World!"
"What?"
The Ninth Princess's expression darkened instantly.
"Which faction killed him?"
Was Ghost slain before the Inner World even opened? Or was he killed during the struggle for entry?
"Your Highness, we recovered footage from the auxiliary intelligence device carried by one of his team members. Please take a look."
A holographic screen projected from the soldier's wrist. In it appeared the scene of Rowan's group killing Ghost.
"So it was them."
The Ninth Princess's face grew colder.
"Your Highness, we've already investigated their identities. They belong to the Three-Axe Mountain faction. When the faction arrived at the Inner World, those four were immediately escorted away under protection."
"Forget it. Do not provoke them for now."
The Ninth Princess closed her eyes for a moment. Despite her dissatisfaction, she remained rational.
Three-Axe Mountain had personally shielded them the moment they arrived. That meant these four prodigies were valued figures.
Behind Three-Axe Mountain stood two immortals and a realm lord capable of rivaling a military dominion-level immortal.
Even the Black Dragon Mountain Empire would not cross such a force lightly.
These four geniuses were clearly under heavy protection. Killing them simply to avenge a minor subordinate would be foolish and would only cause endless trouble.
She weighed the costs and decided it was not worth it.
Right now, the priority was collecting ore.
She immediately ordered her forces to sweep the surrounding regions in a fan-shaped formation, killing everyone they encountered and taking their ore.
It was already the seventh day. All factions had nearly reached saturation in the ore they gathered. Although unexplored areas still existed, the exploitable regions were few, and finding more ore would now take time.
Compared to that, robbery was far more efficient.
Murder and plunder were faster.
…
Meanwhile, the Imperial Martial Regiment and the Hundred Tigers Pavilion stood in a tense standoff. Killing intent filled the air.
Ten kilometers away, Rowan and his team were already lying in wait on a sloping ridge.
"Third Brother, one big unit and one small one. Imperial Martial Regiment and Hundred Tigers Pavilion. Kill or not?" Luo Feng's eyes gleamed crimson as he turned to Rowan for the final decision.
"Kill. Wealth favors the bold. If not now, then when?" Rowan's voice was cold, murderous intent surging around him like a beast unleashed.
With a single command, he shot forward atop his Skyrend Shuttle.
His magic cloud vine erupted like a crimson tidal wave. Seventy-two main vines, each spanning more than three hundred kilometers, spread across the sky like monstrous claws, emitting a deep rustling hum.
"Kill!" Luo Feng roared, his aura exploding outward. The golden-horned beast within him flashed in his eyes with bloodthirsty brilliance.
His magic cloud vine surged from his body, intertwining with Rowan's like twin dragons sweeping the battlefield. Their combined strike was so powerful that the very air shrieked as if being torn apart.
Hong followed steadily, his calm composure in stark contrast to the chaos. "Second Brother, hold steady. Follow the plan. Magic cloud vines for full assault. Iron River, Proudsteel, prepare for ranged support."
He unleashed his own magic cloud vine. Though fewer in number, his vines were thicker, tougher, and quickly formed a defensive sphere around their group before lashing out toward the enemy.
"Finally, a proper battle!" Lei Shen laughed wildly. Lightning crackled from his laser rifle as he charged behind Hong.
Iron River gripped his weapon tightly, keeping pace.
When the Imperial Martial Regiment and Hundred Tigers Pavilion saw the monstrous power surging toward them, they froze in terror. The sheer scale of the vines blocked out the sky.
Their formation crumbled instantly.
"Magic cloud vine… at this size? This is cosmic-rank! How can there be this many?" Qiu Yu's eyes widened. His hands trembled violently around his weapon.
The Regiment's captain went pale as he screamed, "Don't panic! They're just a handful! We outnumber them! Kill them all!"
But the fear in his voice betrayed him.
Rowan rushed in first, bare-handed yet unstoppable.
His vine snapped around a Hundred Tigers fighter like a living serpent. "Help…" The man barely squeezed out a syllable before the vine contracted, bones cracking in rapid succession. His body twisted grotesquely before collapsing like a broken doll.
Luo Feng's vines lashed out like titanic steel whips.
A single strike hurled dozens of soldiers into the ground, where their bodies burst apart into pieces.
The captain fired his C2-grade laser cannon, a weapon capable of killing cosmic-rank beings. The blast tore through several vine segments, but the severed parts regrew instantly, as if time were rewinding.
"What… impossible! It regenerated?"
He fired again and again, panic rising. His shots broke more vines, yet each one regenerated almost instantly.
His mind went blank. Out of the hundreds he brought, fewer than three hundred remained.
Humans were fragile before cosmic-rank lifeforms.
Both factions were now in complete chaos.
"Fight back! Group up and attack together! We need to carve out a path!" Qiu Yu shouted, trying to salvage order.
Mental-force users, heavy mechs, laser cannons, combat blades. All unleashed in a desperate barrage aimed at Rowan, Luo Feng, and Hong.
They knew that killing the vine's host would kill the vines themselves.
Screams and explosions mixed like a violent storm.
Hong's vines formed a barrier around Rowan and Luo Feng while striking outward, tearing through enemies with ruthless efficiency.
Lei Shen fired precise shots, each one exploding an enemy into ash.
Iron River and Proudsteel guarded Rowan closely, cutting down anyone who got too close.
Within a minute, more than forty percent of both factions had died.
Only the swiftest and most agile fighters survived the initial sweep, dodging the massive vines by sheer luck and speed. A cluster of psychic users collectively slowed several vines with mental force, delaying death by seconds.
But death was only delayed, not avoided.
Their formations collapsed entirely.
"We'll die at this rate! Summon the ships! Use the particle cannons!" Qiu Yu screamed.
Three C2-class warships lifted into the sky, their C4-grade particle cannons locking onto Rowan's group with lethal energy gathering at the muzzle.
"Particle cannons incoming!" Lei Shen shouted.
Rowan remained calm. "Do not panic. The vines can take it."
His mind commanded the vines, which wove together into a massive protective dome around the group, a fortress of living crimson armor as the cannons prepared to fire.