The other side found Meng Chuan's explanation hard to accept.
"He can't change it, can't grant us..."
"Is there some rule in that other world forbidding him from interfering with other worlds?"
"Perhaps he simply doesn't want to."
Immortals, eternal life, Divine Abilities—all those temptations lay before them, yet remained beyond their reach. How painful was that?
No one wanted to accept such an outcome.
In ancient times, people had kept searching even without hope. Now that a living example stood before them, how could they possibly hold back?
Then Meng Chuan's voice sounded again in every monitoring room.
"Earth has no real immortals or gods. It has no soil from which Extraordinary Power can grow."
"That is because of Earth itself."
Meng Chuan spoke frankly.
"I showed myself only to tell you to make the most of what you already hold."
Then Meng Chuan looked in another direction—toward the Ocean.
"I'll take care of the trouble. It won't affect this land."
The liaison fell silent for a moment, then said solemnly, "We support you."
Meng Chuan smiled. A clever thing to say.
"I'll go to the Ocean's edge. You can keep watch, but there's no need to send anyone else."
With that, Meng Chuan vanished from the spot, soaring away into the unseen.
Once they knew Meng Chuan had used not technology but the Daoist arts and Divine Abilities of legend, his sudden disappearance no longer brought space-jump technology to mind.
Instead, they thought of shrinking the earth to an inch, teleportation, and Endless Distance in a Step—powers beyond the ordinary.
One path led to cultivation and power vested in oneself; the other, to research and the gradual advance of technology until it could achieve the impossible. It was hard to judge which was better.
But if it came