After hanging up, Ye Chen turned to A Zhui beside him and smiled. "Dukao is so stingy it's infuriating. Sometimes I really feel like killing the old bastard. He can't see the bigger picture at all."
Hearing this, Angel Yan beside him couldn't help laughing. "If Dukao could see the bigger picture, the war between the De Nuo civilizations ten thousand years ago wouldn't have happened.
"According to the records of the Angel Civilization, Dukao was the highest-ranking military commander of Nuo Star back then. He was also the one who single-handedly started the war against De Star. As the conflict escalated, it spiraled out of control.
"That was how Dukao got the nickname 'War Maniac.' You could say that he was responsible for at least half of the destruction of the De Nuo civilizations. That's why his reputation across the universe is absolutely terrible."
Ye Chen nodded. If Dukao had simply been a soldier, he would undoubtedly have been an excellent one. But when it came to anything else, he was a lost cause.
In particular, despite being the supreme commander of the De Nuo civilizations, Dukao had no idea what a god even was. It was absurd. Otherwise, he wouldn't have been killed by a single God-Slaying Bullet in the future.
[This is the author's interpretation of this part of the anime's story: Dukao had no understanding of what gods were, which was why he was so easily killed by a God-Slaying Bullet. If you have a different take, feel free to leave a comment.]
After returning to the Yanhuang Empire, Ye Chen sent all the technical documents he had acquired to the Imperial Academy of Sciences.
There were three particularly important technologies among them: controlled nuclear fusion, Dark Dimension communications, and the technology for building a type of spacecraft.
Besides those three core technologies, the rest were a hodgepodge of information at the Homeworld Civilization level. They also all had one thing in common: not a single one involved weapons.
That old bastard Dukao hadn't dared to give him any weapons technology, afraid Ye Chen would come after him and use the weapons they built against them.
Although he hadn't obtained any weapons-related information, Ye Chen was still very satisfied with the outcome.
After all, he had never intended to let them leave Blue Star in the first place. He'd used a condition that was never going to be met to get all these technical documents for free. What was there to complain about?
Once the Yanhuang Empire had fully absorbed this knowledge, it would surely be able to join the ranks of Level 1 Interstellar Civilizations.
Time passed, and half a year went by in the blink of an eye.
The Yanhuang Empire had completely occupied the entire European Continent.
From then on, the European Continent became part of Yanhuang territory.
That same year, major powers including the Russian Dynasty, the Kazakh Khanate, the Mughal Empire, the Safavid Dynasty, the Zunghar Khanate, and the Qosot Khanate sent envoys to the Yanhuang Empire's European headquarters to "negotiate peace."
Of course, "peace negotiations" was just a nicer way of putting it. In essence, they were submitting and asking to become vassals of the Yanhuang Empire.
Yanhuang Empire, Xuanhuang City.
After hanging up the phone, Ye Chen couldn't help smiling. "Looks like we won't need to go to war for our next round of expansion."
Then he turned to Yuan Lan. "Issue an imperial decree. Order Gu Hongchen to head to our European base immediately and take charge of these negotiations..."
"Yes, Your Majesty!"
The next afternoon.
Yanhuang Empire's European headquarters.
Gu Hongchen stepped off the plane in the Yanhuang Empire's standard uniform, followed by a group of people.
"General Wu Dongming pays his respects to Lady Gu!" Wu Dongming, the highest-ranking commander at the European headquarters, immediately saluted when he saw Gu Hongchen.
"General Wu, there's no need to be so formal..."
Looking at Wu Dongming, Gu Hongchen replied with an expressionless face, her features soft and beautiful.
Her voice was gentle and warm, yet her frost-cold expression made her seem distant and unapproachable.
This contradictory air was due to the fact that she had been expressionless since childhood. Anyone who didn't know her well would assume she was difficult to get along with.
Seeing her, Wu Dongming had instinctively come to the same conclusion.
Wu Dongming then led a few people away to rest.
The next day, a massive hall was bustling with activity. Its occupants were envoys from various countries.
The leading envoys were all royal heirs or crown princes. Clearly, every country took these "peace talks" very seriously. They had no choice—otherwise, their countries would be destroyed.
Gu Hongchen strode up to the platform and took the central seat, gazing down expressionlessly at the noisy crowd below.
The people below also noticed Gu Hongchen. She stood out far too much: she was the only woman in the enormous hall.
And she was seated in the principal place on the platform.
Seeing this, the people below grew furious, but they didn't dare show it, cowed by the might of the Yanhuang Empire.
In most of their countries, women were nothing more than dependents. Seeing that the Yanhuang Empire had sent only a woman made them think the empire was insulting them and didn't take them seriously at all.
As time passed, the atmosphere in the hall grew increasingly tense. Under Gu Hongchen's cold gaze, everyone felt as though they were suffocating.
"Envoys from the Persian Empire, Qosot Khanate, and Bukhara: you may return home."
At the very start, Gu Hongchen named several countries in an even tone, as though she were saying something perfectly ordinary.
But to the envoys she had named, her words were like a thunderclap.
They went weak all over, cold sweat prickling down their backs.
Because with those words, Gu Hongchen had effectively sentenced their countries to death.
As soon as she finished speaking, soldiers rushed in from outside, seized the envoys from the countries she had named, and roughly dragged them out, ignoring their struggles.
When the doors closed behind them, their anguished wails could still be heard outside.
Each cry struck the hearts of the envoys in the hall like a sharp blade.
This was an overwhelming show of force right from the start. Who could possibly withstand that?
And it was a brutally bloody warning, bought with the lives of countless people from those expelled countries.
There was no need to guess. Those countries were doomed.
Now, when they looked at Gu Hongchen on the platform, their eyes held nothing but fear and awe. They saw her lovely, delicate face as the disguise of a demon.
After all, who could have imagined that such a pretty, fragile-looking woman had just condemned millions, even tens of millions, of people to death with a single sentence?
On the platform.
Gu Hongchen remained expressionless, not a flicker in her eyes, as though she hadn't been the one to speak.
She felt nothing about having sentenced those countries to ruin and tens of millions of civilians to death. She felt no pity whatsoever.
She was a fanatical believer in Emperor Ye Chen. In her world, there was only Emperor Ye Chen and the Yanhuang Empire. No matter how many people from other countries died, she would never feel the slightest pity.
Before you continue