"?"
Chen Shu's first instinct was to check who had posted the video.
It was the official National Daily account.
Then it couldn't be fake.
Chen Shu tapped the link below, opened a partner site, and read the report carefully.
Duqin lay at the easternmost edge of Western Province. It was a chaotic Small Nation, plagued by constant war, mainly for two reasons: its rich Spirit Crystal deposits and its position at the junction of the Central-West Continent. That made it a chessboard for the great powers.
The Cube had been found in territory controlled by Duqin's government, but it was also very close to the front line.
After reading the news, Chen Shu laid his phone facedown on the thin blanket and stared into the darkness at the ceiling, deep in Thought.
By international consensus, a Cube belonged to the country where it was unearthed. In practice, if one was found in a Small Nation, that country would voluntarily hand most of its contents to a great power in exchange for benefits.
Voluntarily, of course.
A Cube was simply too valuable.
Its value took several forms.
When it came to historical Cultural Relics, some Small Nations lacked the means to catalog them and often had to ask great powers for help. Some had enough backbone to keep the Cultural Relics in the end. Others could barely protect themselves; their chaotic domestic situation made protecting the Cultural Relics impossible. Even setting everything else aside, officials and warlords at every level would make most of them disappear. They couldn't keep them even if they wanted to.
Then there were the Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures.
Those that still existed elsewhere weren't important.
Great powers could study extinct ones and try to bring them back, while Small Nations could only use them