Qian Xunji... You Bastard Who Deserves to Die!

In the Firmament's spacetime, at the base in the great canyon.

The acrid smell of gunpowder and charred flesh hung over the scorched earth, plowed flat by artillery fire.

The two Titled Douluo had become two heaps of mangled flesh in the mud, impossible to piece back together.

Atop the armored train's turret.

Lin Fan wore work clothes stained black with coal. He casually tossed a special-steel anti-materiel sniper rifle onto the deck, its barrel still hot.

He shook his right arm, irritated by the numbness left by the monstrous recoil.

"Tch. That was all the health they had? What a letdown."

Lin Fan looked over the wreckage strewn across the ground. Far from showing the slightest reverence for slaying gods, he complained in disgust. "The game's balance designer must have water on the brain. The boss mobs have ridiculous mobility, but their physical defense is paper-thin. They can't even take one armor-piercing round at Mach five. That's it?"

He turned and rapped impatiently on the train's armor, addressing empty air. "System! Quit playing dead and pinching pennies. I soloed both end-stage bosses. Hurry up and settle my clear rewards!"

[Host detected successfully annihilating all high-ranking enemy forces at the second defensive line!]

[Congratulations, host! You have achieved the epic hidden achievement—Twilight of the Transcendent!]

[Limited side-quest final upgrade awarded: Thunder base railway logistics network fully completed! Armored heavy train deep-mountain cruise mode officially unlocked!]

Bzz—!

As the system's crisp notification sounded, a brilliant blue glow spread across the map of the Ten Thousand Mountains in Lin Fan's private game view.

Rumble—!

No mortal laborers had to lay it down hammer blow by hammer blow.

Under the mighty construction power of the system reward, heavy black rails and the thick, rot-treated hardwood sleepers beneath them extended automatically along the canyon toward the coking coal mines in the depths of the base, then onward to the distant wasteland. Like living black vines, they laid themselves at a furious pace!

Where mountains stood, roads opened; where rivers ran, bridges rose!

Steel arteries pierced the entire Ten Thousand Mountains in the blink of an eye!

"Hahahahaha! This damn game system finally came through for once!"

Lin Fan watched the railway network take shape in an instant and burst into delighted laughter.

He yanked open the cab door and jumped into the steam locomotive, thick with coal smoke and heat. Gripping the heavy whistle cord with both hands, he hauled it down hard!

"Wooooooo—!!!"

A long whistle shattered the clouds and thundered through the mountains, announcing heavy industry's complete dominion over this land!

"The supply line's open! No more pushing ore and ammunition by hand!" Lin Fan's eyes blazed like a war maniac's. "All forces, listen up! Crank everything to full power and build me an army in this natural fortress! However many gods come, I'll bury every last one under cannon fire today!!!"

Yet.

While Lin Fan enthusiastically built infrastructure over his "game reward" on this side.

The moment he sounded that whistle within the Firmament and the railway network finished its comprehensive upgrade.

Outside the Firmament, in the real spacetime.

Fasinuo Province, the ruined battlefield of the real Tack Town.

Here, a change arrived that plunged every top powerhouse on the continent into despair!

Reality had already been caught in an impossible bind after Spirit Hall's Soul Douluo was shredded by a Maxim machine gun and its Soul Kings blown into a rain of blood by pressure mines...

At that moment, everyone suddenly felt the already battered earth beneath their feet convulse as never before!

This was no earthquake.

This was divine power, defying every law of physics and every principle of Soul Power in the real world, forcibly tearing reality apart!

Crack! Crack! Craaack—!!!

Metal shrieked against metal and rock strata split, the sounds sawing at their very souls!

Beside the real Tack Town, an irresistible force tore the hard granite bedrock and muddy scorched earth apart.

Under everyone's horrified gaze.

Heavy steel sleepers and two black rails followed the route Lin Fan had laid within the Firmament. Inch by inch, they were forced up from deep beneath the real world... squeezing into existence!

"Creeeak—boom!"

Dirt flew and sparks scattered!

The rails were like black metal centipedes bursting from the soil. Reeking of machine oil and cold as steel, they raced across the real plains fast enough to watch them grow!

No blacksmiths were needed. No workers.

Wherever Lin Fan laid rails inside the Firmament, the earth of the real world was ripped open, and identical rails were branded, unchanged, onto reality's map!

Across the rain-lashed wasteland, the harsh clang of steel rolled endlessly toward the horizon, toward the heartland of the Heaven Dou Empire, even toward Spirit City—like Death's footsteps tolling a funeral bell!

"They're overlapping... That world is devouring reality..."

In midair.

Yu Yuanzhen, master of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Sect, possessed what was hailed as the world's strongest Power Attack System Beast Martial Soul and had always had a fiery temper.

Now he stared at the cold rail that had just burst from the earth and spread past the edge of his boot.

The Thunder Douluo was so frightened he stumbled three full steps backward in midair. Even the raging lightning shrouding him fell apart!

He fixed his eyes on the oil-scented rail. His lips had lost all color, and his voice trembled like a leaf in the wind. "Whatever that man builds inside the Firmament... descends into the real world! He isn't making weapons in that world... He's using them to turn reality, bit by bit, into his steel fortress!!!"

"Madness... It's all madness! This is divine punishment! This is slaughter!!!"

Chrysanthemum Douluo Yue Guan screamed. He no longer cared about the dignity of a Titled Douluo, much less seizing any blueprints.

He turned straight into a streak of golden light and fled toward Spirit City without looking back!

Stay here until the rails were finished? Until that armored train bristling with cannons appeared in reality too?!

Stay and wait to die?!

This physical miracle spanning two universes, along with the battle's sudden reversal within the Firmament, ignited two utterly different frenzies across the two spacetimes!

In the Firmament's spacetime, at the Papal Palace in Spirit City.

Qian Xunji's eyes burned bloodred. He had watched the two Titled Douluo elders he sent get blown apart by a mortal's single shot. He had watched the black rails heralding the Industrial Revolution begin to spread toward Spirit City!

"Madman! Yu Xiaogang must die! Spirit Hall's ten thousand years of legacy cannot be ruined by a worthless cripple!!"

Qian Xunji raised the Pope Token high. "Pass down my death decree! Summon every elder still in seclusion! Begin the continent-wide purge! I'll lead the expedition myself and tear that Yu-surnamed devil and his iron monstrosities to pieces!!!"

Rumble!

In the Firmament's spacetime, Angel Divine Light shot into the sky. The army Qian Xunji had mustered with all of Spirit Hall's resources revealed a terrifying outline bent on destroying everything.

In the real spacetime, at Spirit City's Papal Palace!

Bibi Dong watched Qian Xunji swear within the Firmament to tear Lin Fan to pieces. Not a trace of concern for Spirit Hall's legacy showed in her eyes. Instead, they erupted with world-destroying hatred and madness twisted to its limit!

"Qian Xunji... you bastard who deserves to die!"

Bibi Dong's red lips curled into a chilling sneer. "In that world, you still dare try to hurt him? You still want to destroy the path to Equality he paved for me?"

Within the Firmament, that man had gone alone into the deep mountains to resist Qian Xunji's oppression, forging a steel dragon with his blood and sweat!

And in reality, those rails were truly descending onto the soil of Douluo Continent!

This was the supreme legacy he had left her across spacetime!

"Guards!!!"

Bibi Dong sprang to her feet. The pressure of a level ninety-nine Peerless Douluo swept through the Papal Palace.

The red-robed bishops kneeling below trembled.

"Pass down my Pope Token! Assemble every holy knight order of the real Spirit Hall! March for Tack Town in Fasinuo Province at once!"

Bibi Dong issued an order to protect him that chilled the real Spirit Hall's leadership to the bone:

"Every inch of rail the Firmament Saint Master lays in reality is Spirit Hall's holiest treasure! If either empire or any of the Upper Three Sects dares damage even an inch of rail in reality, if anyone dares obstruct the coming of that steel dragon, annihilate their entire sect! Spare neither chickens nor dogs!"

She was mad!

In this real spacetime, Spirit Hall's reigning Pope was willing to wage war on the whole continent to protect industrial machines capable of destroying the very foundations of Soul Masters!

All because those machines had been built by that Yu-surnamed man!

Meanwhile, in the real Fasinuo Province.

The violent tremors from the rails bursting out of the ground continued.

The Heaven Dou Dragon Soul Guards and Titled Douluo, their courage shattered and their feet carrying them frantically backward, suddenly heard something strange through the howling wind and lashing rain.

"Clack-clack... clack-clack... clack-clack..."

"Wooooooo—!!!!"

The sound had not come from inside the Firmament.

It came from the far end of the cold rails that had just materialized before them in reality... Through the mist of real space, it pierced the barrier between dimensions and echoed clear across the real wasteland!

It was the heavy roar and whistle of the armored train within the Firmament!