The shrill alarm drilled into everyone's eardrums. The enormous screen covering an entire wall of the Central Control Room was awash in blood red.
The warning symbol for "EXTREME DANGER" flashed hundreds of times per second.
"My wolf god! That energy reading... Did that old hag Bibi Dong come here herself?!" Grey Wolf was so startled that he dropped the sausage in his mouth. Every hair on his gray body stood on end as he frantically smacked the control panel, trying to bring up more defensive weapons.
"Spatial teleportation... Even a Titled Douluo couldn't pull off technology like this!" Orochimaru had shed his languid air. His golden, serpentine eyes fixed on the purple dot rapidly growing on the screen, and for the first time, his expression turned grave.
Only Qin Feng remained calmly seated in the chair at the main control console.
He even had time to leisurely finish his last sip of hot cocoa.
"What's there to panic about?" Qin Feng set down his cup, and the chaos in the control room instantly subsided.
"Put the exterior surveillance feed on the main screen," he ordered coolly. "And connect to Sect Master Ning's carriage while you're at it. Let him enjoy the show, too."
Grey Wolf froze. Though confused, he immediately followed the order.
The screen split in two.
On the left was the sky fifty kilometers east of Nuoding City. In the pitch-black night, a massive spatial rift was being forcibly torn open, and a heart-chilling purple light shone from within.
On the right was Ning Fengzhi's luxurious carriage, which had just left the city gates.
In the feed, Ning Fengzhi, Sword Douluo, and Bone Douluo stood outside the carriage, staring up in horror at the world-shattering sight in the sky.
"Is this... Divine Punishment?" Ning Rongrong's face had gone deathly pale. She clutched Ning Fengzhi's sleeve tightly.
Sword Douluo Chen Xin already had a hand on his sword hilt. Against power of this magnitude, his sword might not even pierce a sheet of paper.
Just then, a seemingly inconspicuous communicator inside the carriage suddenly crackled to life with Qin Feng's lazy voice.
"Don't leave just yet, Sect Master Ning."
"The show's only just beginning."
As soon as he finished speaking—
RUMBLE!!!
The spatial rift in the sky suddenly expanded to its limit, and a colossal object came hurtling out, wrapped in raging purple lightning!
It was a hundred-meter-long metal construct, so ugly it looked like a heap of scrap pieced together from Garbage Mountain. Yet the countless energy-engine nozzles covering its surface and its immensely thick armor plates made its terrifying power unmistakable.
It hovered above Nuoding City, its shadow covering almost half the city.
Ning Fengzhi felt his breath catch in his throat.
This thing... Could this be that madman's weapon?
What was he planning to do? Destroy Nuoding City? Or... destroy the entire Heaven Dou Empire?!
"Beep! Scrap King No. 2 has arrived at the designated coordinates."
"Spatial jump engine operating normally. Energy reserves at seventy-three percent."
"Awaiting instructions for next action."
Ning Fengzhi: "..."
Sword Douluo: "..."
Bone Douluo: "..."
So it was one of their own?!
"The recovery mission went well," Qin Feng said into the control panel's microphone. "Unload the cargo on Sublevel Five, then stand by in outer space. Don't block the sunlight over the city."
"Command confirmed."
The colossal object in the sky slowly opened its lower hatch. A tractor beam shot down, precisely enveloping an invisible area, then quickly pulled it into the hold.
Next, blue flames burst from its rear engines. Its massive body turned with agility that belied its size, then shot straight into the sky and vanished over the horizon in the blink of an eye.
The sky returned to calm.
Ning Fengzhi stood motionless. Only when the evening breeze brushed past him did he realize his back was drenched in sweat.
"Sect Master Ning," Qin Feng's voice came through again, tinged with amusement. "Interested in coming back to see what all those mineral resources of yours will become?"
Fifteen minutes later.
Ning Fengzhi was back inside the Umbrella Corporation.
This time, he had no complaints at all. In fact, he seemed almost reverent, as if entering a holy place.
Qin Feng didn't take him to the production workshop. Instead, he led him straight into a high-speed elevator that descended underground.
The elevator plunged downward. Reinforced transparent glass lined both sides, revealing the underground structure as it rushed past.
Sublevel Two was packed with barracks and training grounds.
Sublevel Three was the Central Control Room they had just seen.
Sublevel Four housed Orochimaru's Biological Laboratory. Ning Rongrong let out another startled cry when she caught a glimpse of enormous cultivation tanks and dissected Soul Beast specimens.
At last, the elevator stopped at Sublevel Five.
"Ding."
The moment the doors opened, a strange odor washed over them—a mixture of ozone, concentrated Nutrient Solution, and the body odor of some kind of creature.
The sight before them left even Ning Fengzhi, the richest man on the continent and no stranger to grand spectacles, utterly unable to think.
It was an enormous underground space, with a ceiling a hundred meters high.
At its center, a giant lizard more than six meters long was fixed to a massive life-support system by countless thick metal braces and energy conduits.
It was the thousand-year Soul Beast, the Thunder Tyrannosaurus!
It wasn't dead.
Its chest still rose and fell in a steady rhythm, but its limbs and head were locked in place by thick alloy restraints.
Countless cables thicker than a man's arm connected to its body from every direction like parasitic vines. They were especially concentrated around the lightning sac where it stored its electrical power, which was riddled with energy-extraction probes.
Blue-purple arcs of electricity leaped between its scales and the cables, crackling as they went.
The current traveled through the cables and gathered in rows of massive battery banks that rose around them like mountains.
The entire underground space hummed with the power of the immense electrical current.
This wasn't a laboratory.
It was a... power plant!
A biological nuclear power station... with a living thousand-year Soul Beast at its core!
"This... This..." Ning Fengzhi pointed at the still-breathing Thunder Tyrannosaurus. His lips trembled, but he couldn't get a word out.
He'd always thought Qin Feng had captured the Soul Beast for its Soul Ring and Soul Bone.
He'd never dreamed that Qin Feng would... keep it alive!
"Quite a sight, isn't it?" Qin Feng spread his arms, as if showing off his proudest creation.
"Tell me, Sect Master Ning. What is the value of a Soul Beast?"
"Th-the Soul Ring and Soul Bone. Its immense power..." Ning Fengzhi answered instinctively.
"Wrong!" Qin Feng declared.
"Kill a thousand-year Soul Beast, and you get one Soul Ring and one Soul Bone. It's a one-time deal. Its value is completely wrung out in that instant."
Qin Feng pointed at the Thunder Tyrannosaurus, his eyes feverish.
"All I had to do was perform a small operation, implant a life-support system, and provide enough Nutrient Solution. For the next fifty years, it can supply my base with over a hundred thousand kilowatts of stable power, twenty-four hours a day, without interruption!"
"One Soul Ring, or fifty years of immense energy. Tell me, Sect Master Ning—which is more valuable?"
"This is called sustainable development. It's also called... an ecological cycle!"
Qin Feng walked over to Ning Fengzhi and patted him on the shoulder. His voice brimmed with disdain for the rules of this world.
"You Soul Masters are like a bunch of primitive savages, living off the land. You sit on mountains of gold, yet all you do is chip off a few crumbs and congratulate yourselves."
"What I'm going to do is haul the entire mountain of gold into my factory and smelt it into whatever I want!"
Ning Fengzhi stared at the Thunder Tyrannosaurus generating power, then at Qin Feng's young face, etched with madness.
In that moment, his worldview was utterly crushed and rebuilt.
So... Soul Beasts could be used this way?
So... the hunting they took pride in was so primitive and laughable in the face of true civilization?
He understood now.
Qin Feng didn't want his mines or his money.
He wanted the resources of the entire world!
And the agreement he'd signed wasn't a contract of servitude.
It was a ticket... aboard the ark of a new age!
"I understand... I understand completely!" An unprecedented light flared in Ning Fengzhi's eyes. He bowed deeply to Qin Feng, his manner utterly respectful.
"Boss Qin! No... Master! From this day on, I, Ning Fengzhi, will be your most loyal mine manager! Wherever you point, I'll dig!"
Just then, the communicator at Ning Fengzhi's waist rang again.
It was a message from the Guardian stationed at the factory entrance. The voice was cold and mechanical.
"Reporting to the boss. A message has arrived from the city gates."
"Platinum Bishop Salas of Spirit Hall has arrived outside Nuoding City with the other two members of the Golden Generation."
"Their convoy attempted to force its way into the city."
"Our gate guards stopped them."
Before you continue