Counter-Tide Truth, the Last Light in Despair

Faced with the brutal Hun Zhan that had been reduced to nothing, Qi Sheng attempted to establish a spiritual connection with it.

The mutilated body still seemed to emanate a powerful residual force.

But his consciousness had long since fallen into endless chaos, barely surviving only thanks to the "momentum" forged by his indomitable will and the Undying Grand Formation.

Death energy was constantly being generated and eroding his body, making it impossible for him to communicate at all.

Their condition is even worse than the original Four Gods.

The idea of Recruitment Hun Zhan has been temporarily put aside.

He did consider rebuilding Hun Zhan's broken divine body, and then using the Purification power of Nine Yin to cleanse the corrosive power left in his body by the three Black Tide Demon Gods from back then.

However, the current reserves of Sacrificial Power Pool are far from sufficient to achieve this, barely enough to restore him to consciousness for even a few seconds.

Forcibly attempting to awaken the spirit will not only fail to achieve its purpose, but will also waste a large amount of Sacrificial Power, resulting in more harm than good.

In the blink of an eye, Qi Sheng no longer focused on the Hun Zhan itself, but expanded his Perception range, scanning every corner of the underground palace inch by inch.

The walls of the underground palace are covered with marks from the Conquest by the Tidal Rebellion Legion throughout the ages.

The air was thick with the aura of war, the lingering killing intent accumulated from countless battles. Any ordinary deity who dared to step in would have their soul Shatter by this aura.

However, the entire underground palace could not conceal the dense aura of death constantly emanating from the remnants of the Hun Zhan and the decaying spirits.

It is certain that the current Tidal Rebellion Legion's Hun Zhan is the core, but the real power lies with the millions of crimson-robed subordinate gods connected to the throne, who can also be called: War Priest.

While striving to prolong the life of the Hun Zhan, they each command a portion of the Tidal Rebellion Legion.

Warfare, resource allocation, training and development, merit assessment, war zone delineation, internal law enforcement, logistical support—all these affairs are issued outwards by them through the orders of Hun Zhan, working together to maintain the continuous operation of the Tidal Rebellion Legion.

The long-standing doubts in Qi Sheng's heart were thus resolved.

Back then, he didn't understand why Hun Zhan dared to shout the arrogant claim, "I will Transcendence Di Zhao."

As one of the Eight Extremes Gods, Hun Zhan must know that Di Zhao God's power is vast and boundless. Even the ultimate goal of the Four Gods is to inherit Di Zhao's original power, but Hun Zhan dares to say that Transcendence Di Zhao.

But even the "power of war" in his hands was a gift from the Di Zhao.

To achieve this is as difficult as climbing to the sky.

Looking back now, what seemed like Hun Zhan's arrogance was actually a ploy to boost confidence and pave the way for building the Tidal Rebellion Legion, giving this legion the confidence to challenge the peak from the very beginning.

This slogan is the "soul" of the Tidal Rebellion Legion.

Qi Sheng sighed inwardly.

He could imagine what Hun Zhan was thinking when he made that oath.

With a single bold statement, he created a hopeful future for his countless warriors, giving them the courage to fight on even in darkness and despair.

This Soul Power filled him with respect.

Unfortunately, reality is cruel.

It will not deviate from his personal will in any way.

Hun Zhan was clearly aware at the time that his condition was Deterioration and that he was barely able to stay alive.

But the secret must not be revealed.

To this end, he built this underground temple and sealed it off layer by layer.

The War Priest inside were prepared to never emerge again, sacrificing themselves and using their souls as locks to seal the most core secrets of the Tidal Rebellion Legion within the underground palace.

The Sacrificial Power Pool burst into flames at that moment.

Information about these War Priest kept flooding into Qi Sheng's mind.

Among them are the patriarchs of top-tier powerful clans who have followed Hun Zhan since the rise of the Tidal Rebellion Legion, the war priests who have exhausted their life's cultivation to condense the War Imprint, and the subordinate gods who once followed the Four Gods —they were all once powerful figures who possessed a territory in the Monster World, yet they were willing to be trapped in this dark and sunless underground for the sake of the oath of Hun Zhan and the survival of the Tidal Rebellion Legion, burning themselves day after day.

Some of the War Priest ' spirits were already on the verge of collapse, yet they were still gritting their teeth and holding on, constantly drawing their own power to nourish the remnants of the Hun Zhan and reinforce the palace's restrictions.

From the moment they stepped into this underground palace, they had cut off all escape routes.

Once the Hun Zhan are completely destroyed, the Tidal Rebellion Legion will lose its faith, and the sacrifices of countless warriors in the early stages will become meaningless.

Only by working together with Hun Zhan to safeguard the foundation of the Tidal Rebellion Legion's rise can we have a brand new future.

By delving deeper into the information flooding his mind, Qi Sheng glimpsed the deepest secrets hidden within these War Priest.

From the day they were trapped underground, they secretly prepared a backup plan called "Rekindling the Flame".

This plan was their last escape route for the Tidal Rebellion Legion, and their only hope for salvation.

They had all foreseen that there was no way to reverse the decline of Hun Zhan for the time being, and that the corrosive power that penetrated deep into the soul might one day completely devour the remnants and consciousness of Hun Zhan.

Therefore, from the very beginning, they were quietly planning an almost impossible undertaking to pass on their legacy.

The core of this plan is to gather all the power of all War Priest at the moment when Hun Zhan is completely destroyed, extract the remaining power essence from Hun Zhan's body, forcibly condense it into a War God Seal, and then use this god seal as a foundation to give birth to a new Counter-Tide God, who will succeed Hun Zhan, take charge of the Tidal Rebellion Legion, and inherit the oath of "Transcendence the Di Zhao".

However, this plan has been sealed away by the War Priest since its inception, and will never be easily activated unless the Hun Zhan is completely destroyed and the Tidal Rebellion Legion is on the verge of annihilation.

They clung to a sliver of hope, expecting to wait until the day when the Hun Zhan regained consciousness and the corrosive power was dispelled.

Backup plans are never the outcome they want.

But Qi Sheng knew in his heart that this inheritance plan was simply not feasible.

The war power in Hun Zhan's hands, and even his own divine foundation, were all bestowed by the Di Zhao God. In a sense, Hun Zhan can be regarded as a special Origin Source vessel, bearing the war power bestowed by Di Zhao. His existence is closely bound to this power, sharing its life and death.

Once the Hun Zhan is completely extinguished, the war power originating from Di Zhao within him will lose its vessel and re-integrate into the Monster World.

For War Priest to attempt to capture the essence from the scattered power after the demise of the Hun Zhan, forcibly condense it into War God Seal that can be passed down, and then give birth to a new Counter-Tide God, is tantamount to trying to catch the moon in the sea.

The difficulty is no less than that of an external force taking in a Primal Monster.

Dispelling the flashback, Qi Sheng fell silent.

As his thoughts raced, he abandoned the idea of communicating with these millions of War Priest and Recruitment them in the name of the Di Zhao.

Even the weakest War Priest currently possesses combat power exceeding that of the Demigod Realm.

Converting this group of high-end combatants into players would require him to pay a huge price in Sacrificial Power.

I also considered Recruitment a few of them and gradually expanding to the entire Tidal Rebellion Legion.

But since it's in the name of the Di Zhao God, it has to live up to the Di Zhao God's prestige.

Recruitment only a few and then filling in the rest later is truly shameful.

Secondly, the current Tidal Rebellion Legion can still continuously produce war resources and is in a stage of rapid development, so there is absolutely no need to interrupt this process.

The best course of action right now is to suppress your desires and wait for the right opportunity.

The future is still long.

He doesn't need to rush to show his prowess; he only needs to lie low, accumulate strength, and wait until he has enough power and Sacrificial Power to intervene in the Tidal Rebellion Legion.

At that time, relying on the Player Camp, they will take up the banner of Counter-Tide.

Integrate millions of war priests, and then bring the entire Tidal Rebellion Legion under Mo's control.

Let this powerful war force become the foundation for his Conquest the Black Tide, and even for future competition on the battlefield of the pinnacle.

As for the Hun Zhan —it won't be difficult to rebuild his broken divine body once he accumulates enough Sacrificial Power.

With the Nine Yin Guardian beside him wielding the power of Purification, there was no corrupting force that could not be dispelled.

Ultimately, it all comes down to a lack of money.

However, bringing the Tidal Rebellion Legion under Mo's control in the future will not be a problem at all.

Although the current Tidal Rebellion Legion far surpasses the Player Camp under its control in terms of resource income and overall strength, it is not on the same level as the players in other aspects.

It's even lagging behind in every aspect.

The same hunting resources, once in his hands, can be transformed into Sacrificial Power through the Di Zhao's Origin.

Whether it's directly injected into the player's body to help them break through, or nourished by the rules and authority of the Four Gods —every resource is used without any waste.

However, in the hands of the Tidal Rebellion Legion, these resources will be broken down layer by layer by a cumbersome growth system.

A significant amount of resources are being used for trivial matters.

For example, mass-producing standard Weapon Equipment; these resources are generally consumables.

It is severely damaged and needs to be melted down and recast, and each recasting will result in losses.

Even many top-tier weapons and equipment require a massive amount of rare and precious materials to forge a single piece.

In contrast, Rune Resonance Weapon in the player's possession can be restored to their original state upon death and reforging, at zero cost.

Their United Battle Formation requires years, even decades, of practice to achieve perfect coordination.

Players can purchase battle formations using Sacrificial Power and achieve perfect coordination through system assistance, directly generating a unified divine statue.

This is just the difference in resource utilization efficiency.

The gap in resource conversion is even greater.

Similarly, upon killing a target, the player will directly extract all of the target's power, including flesh, blood, energy, and consciousness—through the power of All Things Extraction in the Hyperdimension realm, directly converting it into pure energy, and then transforming it into Sacrificial Power through the target's Di Zhao origin.

The energy intensity of Sacrificial Power is incomparable to that of war power.

In order to maximize resource efficiency, the Tidal Rebellion Legion would throw all the enemy's flesh, bones, and energy into the smelting pool after each battle, resulting in severe energy loss during the refining process.

Compared to many Top Civilization Force, the Tidal Rebellion Legion's resource utilization efficiency is several dimensions higher.

However, it is insurmountably different from the Black Tide, let alone comparable to the players.

As for battle losses...

The player's combat losses are always 0, creating a perpetual positive growth cycle.

But for the Tidal Rebellion Legion, every death is a net loss.

It takes them years to train a qualified soldier, and once he dies, the enormous resources and effort they've invested are lost.

Time, as the soldiers fell in battle, all returned to zero.

Although the gains from the war far outweighed the losses, they could completely cover these losses.

However, this positive cycle is built on the foundation of continuous blood loss.

In contrast, even if a player dies ten thousand times, they can still start over.

Which player doesn't carry the weight of "hundreds, thousands" of their own lives on their shoulders?

Every death, from a player's perspective, is an opportunity for Trial and Error.

Every resurrection is a fresh start.

Warriors of the Tidal Rebellion Legion can only survive one battle.

Mistakes meant death, so they had to be cautious and weigh their options repeatedly in all kinds of battles.

Players can take turns going up to die to test a monster's abilities and characteristics, and then switch to another player until they have a clear understanding of the monster's combat habits.

In order to find the optimal route, you can run the Adventurer Dungeon hundreds of times, each time dying in different ways to verify which places you can't step on and which times you can't rush in.

They can even practice their creative tactics thousands of times, and if they fail, they can start over, modify and optimize them, and then continue in actual combat.

Until everyone's teamwork becomes muscle memory, they know where their teammates will go next even with their eyes closed.

Take, for example, the tacit understanding between the Divine Hall Legion.

They honed their skills in war, but in essence, they refined them through constant struggle and death.

The warriors of the Tidal Rebellion Legion gain experience by "staying alive." They dare not make mistakes, because making mistakes will not only kill them but also drag down their brothers.

More importantly, the experience accumulated by a warrior against the Counter-Tide throughout their life will be wiped out upon death.

The combat skills and battle formations honed through countless brushes with death, the battlefield intuition and crisis prediction gained through bloodshed, will all disappear completely after death as consciousness dissipates.

This kind of loss can be seen as a loss of foundation.

A veteran accumulates a wealth of war experience, and the next generation can only follow in their footsteps and accumulate experience all over again.

But players are completely different; their experience accumulates Eternal over time.

Even the most foolish person can take a step forward by standing on their own corpse, and gradually learn how.

This means that the war experience of the Counter-Tide warriors is a consumable, while the war experience of the players is accumulated.

In summary, the Tidal Rebellion Legion is fighting with their lives on the line.

Players are using unlimited lives to farm resources; that's true dimensional superiority.

Therefore, the only thing players lack to Transcendence the Tidal Rebellion Legion is time.

He has plenty of time.

The reason for not interfering with players' growth and granting them complete freedom is because the current Player Camp is still in the early stages of development.

The current Player Camp appears bustling and vibrant, with new tactics and new styles emerging on the Forum every day.

However, from a broader Time Dimension, all of this is still in the early stages of exploration.

Looking back from ten, a hundred, or a thousand years in the future, the current chaos will seem insignificant.

Take the Star Vein System as an example.

Back when there were only a few dozen Monster Soul, the Forum was filled with endless debates about how to combine Star Vein System.

Even if he provides the Optimal Solution, new solutions will emerge with the addition of new Monster Soul.

It's like trying to help a child who has just learned to walk; if you insist on supporting him, he'll never learn to find his own balance.

The same applies to the allocation of resources, including those related to Sacrificial Power.

In the early stages, you have to rack your brains for a long time to figure out how to spend your few hundred points of Sacrificial Power to maximize your benefits.

Whether it's buying a vehicle, purchasing an automatic cultivation technique, or directly investing in Body Tempering Level —it seems meaningful, but in reality, it's not very meaningful. Veteran players these days don't even care about a few hundred points of Sacrificial Power.

Therefore, the development paths and Astral Veins combinations that players argue endlessly about, the resource allocation they struggle over, and the tiny benefits they fight so hard for are, in the long river of time, nothing more than a few stumbling steps taken by a child learning to walk. They are neither right nor wrong, nor do they matter whether they are successful or not.

His rash intervention, setting rules and regulations, might seem to allow players to avoid detours and progress quickly.

In reality, it deprived them of their most precious opportunity to Trial and Error during the pioneering period in the wilderness.

So all he had to do was observe from behind the scenes.

Simply ensure that no truly devastating threat arises.

Then they will find their own way and carve out a path to the future.

Having clarified his thoughts, Qi Sheng's consciousness traversed layers of space and returned to the Origin Altar.

Some things don't need to be rushed.

But there is one thing that can be done now.

That was the resurrection of Duan Xing.

In fact, Duan Xing's life or death was insignificant to his future plans.

He is neither a top-tier, exceptionally talented fighter nor a key figure who can influence future developments; whether he is resurrected or not will have no impact on the rise of the Player Camp.

However, Qi Sheng, mindful of fate, immediately stepped into the game as soon as the Duan Xing appeared, guiding the Player Camp. Although his strength was mediocre, he did his best and can be considered the first link between the Counter-Tide line and the Player Camp.

Now that he is dead and his soul has vanished, let him be given a true new life.

Making him the first player in the Tidal Rebellion Legion ahead of time is a way of repaying his past help.

As soon as the thought was made up, star trails suddenly appeared around Qi Sheng's body. Tiny star points quickly emerged, following the trajectory of the star trails and circling around him, spreading out into a vast Star Sea in the blink of an eye.

As the star trails intertwine, the power of the Di Zhao's Origin is infused into it, transforming into a force that draws the soul.

His gaze once again pierced through the spatial barrier, crossed the vast mountains and seas, and landed on a spot in the Counter-Tide Battlefield.

That is where the Duan Xing fell.

With a wave of his hand, Qi Sheng's divine sense stirred, and a surge of Sacrificial Power power burned out, sweeping outwards.

The shattered soul, the scattered remnants of consciousness in the world—even the last vestige of Duan Xing's will before his death—all condensed into faint streaks of light under the guidance of his divine sense, rapidly gathering together.

Some of the flesh and blood devoured by the Soul Beast had already changed hands several times after the Soul Beast died. Some were integrated into the bodies of other Soul Beast, some were transformed into battlefield baleful energy, and some were even refined and absorbed by the warriors of the Counter-Tide. The process of tracing the source requires peeling back the layers of the original source belonging to Duan Xing from countless intertwined Cause and Effect.

But all this information converged under Qi Sheng's power reversal.

Even if Soul Beast has long since died and its power has been absorbed into the earth, it cannot escape the tracing back to the source by the Di Zhao's original power.

Strands of pale golden power converged from all directions of the void, intertwining and coalescing with the remnants of Duan Xing's consciousness and fragments of divine essence.

Before long, a semi-transparent, blurry phantom appeared in front of him, and one could vaguely make out the tall and imposing figure of Duan Xing from back then.

The illusory image of Duan Xing's consciousness swayed slightly, not yet awakened from the chaos of death, but merely floating blankly in front of him.

Qi Sheng looked at the phantom and waved his hand again. Instantly, a force enveloped the phantom of the Duan Xing and sent it into the Challenger System, sending its consciousness to Earth and reshaping a new physical body.

From then on, "death" was no longer the point of attack for Duan Xing, but merely the prologue to a new chapter.

He will change his identity and continue fighting as a player.

Having done all this, Qi Sheng withdrew his gaze.

The star trails slowly converged, and the vast aura surrounding him returned to calm.

The game of chess against the Counter-Tide is clear, Duan Xing is complete.

Next, Hai continued to watch as the Player Camp, following the path he had laid out, gradually reached its peak.