"Ah!!!"
Salas let out a roar that sounded nothing like a human cry, and his Soul Power spiraled out of control once more!
He wanted to destroy that screen, this city, everything around him!
But the strange infrasound strengthened again.
"Pfft—"
Salas spat out another mouthful of blood and collapsed to the ground like a heap of sludge, convulsing violently.
Xie Yue and Yan were scared out of their wits. They wanted to rush over and help him, but didn't dare move.
Just then—
"Bzzzt..."
A faint mechanical whirring sounded.
Around the corner of the street, a disc-shaped cleaning robot with several mechanical arms slowly glided into view.
It stopped in front of the mess Salas had spat out, extended one mechanical arm, and sprayed white disinfectant foam.
Another arm unfolded a small shovel, scooped up the mess, and tipped it into the waste-recovery compartment on its back.
When it was done, it turned toward Salas, still sprawled on the ground. The red indicator light on top of its head flashed twice.
A cold, synthesized voice spoke: "Large humanoid waste detected. Model: Platinum. Contamination level: High."
"Under the Urban Cleaning Emergency Plan, you will be forcibly recovered and rendered harmless."
As it spoke, the treads beneath the robot began to turn, and two enormous mechanical pincers opened toward Salas.
Holy crap!
They were treating people like garbage now?!
Xie Yue and Yan felt their scalps prickle. If Salas got pulled inside, the Platinum Bishop would probably be disassembled on the spot!
"Stop!" Xie Yue shouted, steeling himself.
The robot stopped. Its red light flashed as if it were receiving new instructions.
A few seconds later, Qin Feng's lazy voice rang out once again through the citywide loudspeakers.
"Forget it. Since you're already here..."
"Bishop Salas, don't lie on the ground. It's filthy."
"I'll show you around my Umbrella Corporation and let you see what kind of 'sanitation company' it really is."
As soon as he finished speaking, the alloy doors of a nearby building slowly opened, revealing a passage that seemed to descend into bottomless darkness.
The cleaning robot retracted its pincers and gestured toward Salas with a polite "after you."
Salas struggled to his feet, wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, and shot the passage a venomous look.
He knew this was a trap.
But he had no choice.
The Pope's orders were to go in and investigate.
He straightened his now filthy robe and stepped inside with heavy strides.
Xie Yue and Yan exchanged a glance, then followed, steeling themselves.
The passage led to a high-speed elevator.
The doors closed, and it began to descend at incredible speed.
Reinforced transparent glass lined both sides, revealing underground structures flashing past outside.
Level B2 was packed with barracks. Countless Guardians in Power Armor were sparring, their movements perfectly synchronized and their presence murderous.
Salas's pupils contracted.
Level B3 was the enormous Central Control Room, where countless screens and streams of data he couldn't understand flickered.
Salas's breath caught.
Level B4 was Orochimaru's Biological Laboratory. He could even see a person bound inside an enormous cultivation tank.
Those clothes... belonged to Hu Liena!
"Nana!" Xie Yue and Yan cried out at the same time.
Salas's heart pounded. He was about to make a scene, but the elevator didn't stop at all. It continued downward.
At last, the elevator stopped at Level B5.
"Ding."
The doors opened.
A strange smell washed over them, a mixture of ozone, highly concentrated Nutrient Solution, and the body odor of some kind of creature.
The sight before him made Salas, a Platinum Bishop with immense power, completely short-circuit.
It was an enormous underground space, its ceiling a hundred meters high.
At its center, the thousand-year-old Soul Beast that should have been in the core region of Star Dou Forest—the Thunder Tyrannosaurus—was held fast in a huge life-support system by countless thick metal braces and energy conduits!
It wasn't dead!
Its chest still rose and fell rhythmically, but its limbs and head were locked tight in heavy alloy restraints.
Countless cables thicker than arms stretched toward it from every direction like parasitic vines. They were connected to its body, especially around the lightning sac where it stored its electrical power, which bristled with densely packed energy-extraction probes!
Blue-violet arcs danced between its scales and the cables, crackling with a "bzzzt."
The current flowed along the cables and collected in rows of enormous batteries, each one as massive as a mountain.
This wasn't a cage for Soul Beasts.
This was a... power plant!
A... biological nuclear power station using a living thousand-year-old Soul Beast as its core!
Salas's mouth fell open. His eyes bulged like copper bells, and a raspy "huh-huh" escaped his throat, but he couldn't get a single word out.
He'd always thought Qin Feng had captured this Soul Beast for its Soul Ring and Soul Bone.
He'd never dreamed Qin Feng would... keep it alive!
And use it as... a battery?!
"Well, look who's here!"
Grey Wolf leaped out from behind one of the enormous batteries, a wrench clenched in his mouth. Seeing the ghost-struck look on Salas's face, he proudly planted his paws on his hips.
"What do you think, old-timer? My genius invention leave you speechless?"
He bounded over to Salas and tapped his knee with the wrench.
"Welcome to my latest masterpiece—the Soul Beast–Powered, Unlimited-Recharge Battery Pack, Model 'Thunder No. 1'!"
Battery pack?!
Salas felt as if those three words were about to blow the top of his skull off.
"See that?" Grey Wolf said, pointing to the Thunder Tyrannosaurus still busy "generating power" as he introduced it like a salesman.
"It has a built-in biological circulation system, automatic Nutrient Solution drip-feeding, and neural activity monitoring. Its power output stays steady at a hundred thousand kilowatt-hours, with a margin of error under 0.1 percent!"
"Do you know how much coal you have to burn to generate one kilowatt-hour? Now all you have to do is feed it some Nutrient Solution. It's less trouble than raising a pig!"
"Best of all, it's green, eco-friendly, and pollution-free!"
"In a few days, once we upgrade the technology, we'll install an 'automatic waste-cleaning and recycling system.' Then it can even produce a little biogas on the side. Perfect!"
Every one of Grey Wolf's words slammed into Salas's already fragile worldview like a heavy hammer.
A thousand-year-old Soul Beast...
A powerful creature countless Soul Masters dreamed of, one they had to risk their lives to hunt down...
Here, it was nothing more than a power generator that was less trouble than a pig?
And it even produced biogas?!
"This... this... You... You're committing sacrilege! This is sacrilege against Soul Beasts! It's sacrilege against divine power!" Salas finally found his voice and shrieked hysterically, pointing at the giant beast.
"Sacrilege?"
Qin Feng's voice drifted in from behind him.
He walked over to Salas, patted him on the shoulder, and looked at the Thunder Tyrannosaurus steadily generating electricity, his eyes full of disdain for primitive civilization.
"One Soul Ring in exchange for decades of stable energy."
"Bishop Salas, tell me: isn't your Spirit Hall's Soul Hunting Operation like a bunch of monkeys guarding a mountain of gold, using stones to knock off a few scraps just to crack walnuts?"
"In my eyes, what you call hunting and absorbing is the most primitive, wasteful, and foolish way of using energy!"
Salas stared blankly at Qin Feng, then at the "battery pack." In that moment, he felt his faith had been completely crushed.
Qin Feng leaned close to his ear and whispered something only the two of them could hear—a sentence that made Salas feel as though he'd plunged into an icy abyss.
"By the way, Bishop Salas..."
"This is only Phase One of the 'Soul Beast Nuclear Power Station.'"
"I've already started planning Phase Two."
"Take a guess: if we used a Level 98 Titled Douluo as a generator, would its power-generation efficiency be even higher?"
Before you continue