Chapter 163: Going to War with the Immortal Temple? (Part 3)

Inside the Heavenly Eclipse Palace.

The Palace Master of Heavenly Eclipse had consistently kept his attention on Jiang Chen, and naturally discovered that Jiang Chen had successfully fused with ten Blood Lokha Crystals to become a "Black Warrior."

Even with the Palace Master of Heavenly Eclipse's vast experience and immense knowledge, he could not help but feel utterly astonished.

If Jiang Chen had spent a long time absorbing baleful aura within the Ancient God Ruins, slowly fusing with the Blood Lokha Crystals to become a "Black Warrior," although it could still be described as monstrous, the Palace Master of Heavenly Eclipse had nonetheless witnessed such geniuses in his lifetime.

However, Jiang Chen had never absorbed any baleful aura at all; upon his very first attempt to fuse with the Blood Lokha Crystals, he directly integrated ten of them simultaneously.

Throughout his endless years of existence, the Palace Master of Heavenly Eclipse had never seen nor even heard of such a thing!

Apart from those beasts within the Star Tower Beast God Alliance who proclaimed themselves to be "Beast God Descendants," the Palace Master of Heavenly Eclipse had never heard of any living being for whom fusing with Blood Lokha Crystals was so effortless, practically as simple as eating and drinking.

"Truly worthy of being the unprecedented monster since the birth of the Primordial Universe!"

Recalling Primal Chaos City Leader's evaluation of Jiang Chen, the Palace Master of Heavenly Eclipse could not help but feel a trace of agreement.

Immediately afterward, the Palace Master of Heavenly Eclipse shook his head slightly and sighed, "Pity that such a monstrous talent walks a 'path' different from mine, making it impossible to take him as a disciple... That Luo Feng, on the other hand, although inferior in talent to Jiang Chen, can still be considered a fine sapling."

"An indigenous planet, yet in the exact same era, two monstrous geniuses emerge?"

"Even after Primal Chaos investigated, no peculiarities were found. Could it truly just be a coincidence?"

The Palace Master of Heavenly Eclipse fell into deep contemplation.

---

On the other side, Jiang Chen and Luo Feng settled down within the Ancient God Ruins.

Jiang Chen brought half of his mechanical legion, on one hand to guard his own safety, and on the other hand to clear out the indigenous practitioners within the Ancient God Ruins, as well as those maniacs whose minds had been controlled by the baleful aura, who had lost their sanity and knew only how to slaughter.

They artificially carved out a "blank zone" within the Ancient God Ruins, effectively isolating the Immortal Temple from Jiang Chen's "mining base."

Meanwhile, the remaining mechanical legion, under the control of Jarvis alongside a massive mining team, took root outside the Ancient God Ruins and began frantically gathering resources.

The mining team displayed to Luo Feng was merely a small fraction of the "miners" in Jiang Chen's possession.

In fact, Jiang Chen possessed a full fifty such scale-sized mining teams under his command.

Under Jarvis's control, these fifty mining teams dispersed, maintaining a moderate distance from one another.

This allowed them to maximize mining efficiency without mutually interfering.

The moment any hostile situation arose, they could rapidly reinforce each other.

These fifty "mineral vein extraction points" were distributed in a fan shape outside the Ancient God Ruins.

There were very few indigenous cities and villages within this region.

After all, even among the natives, aside from those ascetic cultivators who intentionally sought out crises to temper themselves, no one was willing to live too close to the Ancient God Ruins.

Within the resource extraction zone initially selected by Jarvis, there was only a single, relatively small indigenous city, whose strongest inhabitant was merely a Domain Lord.

Jarvis simply dispatched a mechanical squad to easily take control of the city's upper echelons, completely sealing off its communication with the outside world.

As for the absolute core of the entire resource extraction zone—located at the center of the fan-shaped territory—was a cleared and leveled plain.

On this plain, through the relentless efforts of massive engineering machinery, factory after factory rose from the ground, occupying hundreds of thousands of square kilometers of land within just a few short days.

Warehouse zones, alloy smelting zones, material processing zones, component manufacturing zones, assembly zones...

Various distinct sectors were demarcated by wide roads, intersecting and standing densely like a massive chessboard.

Vast quantities of preliminarily refined ores were transported by spacecraft from various resource extraction points, where they were further processed into new engineering machinery, production modules, or combat-type mechanical units.

Under Jarvis's formidable computing capabilities, production ratios were continuously adjusted based on resource output and development capacity to achieve optimal efficiency.

Bolstered by Jiang Chen's multiple mass-production specialties, manufacturing efficiency was preposterously high, with massive quantities of mechanical units rolling out of the factories every single day.

Every day, brand-new processing modules were completed, expanding the scale of this "production base" and further accelerating the efficiency of mass production.

---

Supported by the rich mineral resources of the Blood Lokha Continent, the mechanical army under Jiang Chen's command developed like a snowball rolling downhill.

At the very beginning, they were merely a nearly negligible dot on the map.

Yet the boundaries of this dot continuously expanded, and the speed of expansion grew ever faster.

In less than a decade, the territory they occupied had grown to roughly the same size as the entire "Ancient God Ruins."

Hundreds upon thousands of cities had been brought under Jiang Chen's control.

Or rather, brought under the control of Jarvis.

Furthermore, as the territory grew larger, the "snowballing" speed of the mechanical legion became increasingly terrifying.

If the powerhouses of the Blood Lokha World failed to intervene, it would likely not be long before the entire Blood Lokha Continent fell under the control of the mechanical legion.

However, this was not a world like the Visca Planet, where long-distance communication was extremely difficult.

In particular, the Immortal Temple was not all that far from Jiang Chen's "mining base."

When city after city lost contact, the powerhouses of the Blood Lokha World naturally realized something was amiss. After being reported up through successive layers of command, the news finally reached the upper echelons of the "Immortal Temple."

---

The Immortal Temple was the highest authority on the Blood Lokha Continent and also the most powerful organization across the entire realm.

Throughout endless ages, every powerhouse born on the Blood Lokha Continent who reached the Immortal level or above had invariably joined the Immortal Temple.

Even among World Lords and Domain Lords below the Immortal tier, the majority were members of the Immortal Temple.

In particular, the appointments of all "World Lords" and "Domain Lords" had to be officially sanctioned by the Immortal Temple to take effect.

Geniuses across the continent were likewise absorbed into the Immortal Temple for key cultivation.

Over the long passage of time, the Immortal Temple's rule over the entire Blood Lokha World was exceptionally powerful and terrifying.

Aside from the "Outsiders," nothing could shake the dominion of the Immortal Temple.

Yet, apart from that ancient war from endless ages ago which had nearly wiped out all the high-end combat power of the Blood Lokha World, the Outsiders had never again entered the Blood Lokha World on a massive scale.

As long as the indigenous people of the Blood Lokha World did not attempt to venture beyond the eighteenth layer of clouds, they would not be targeted by Outsider powerhouses.

At most, a few gifted Outsiders would occasionally arrive in the Blood Lokha World to undergo trials, but they were never able to alter the overarching landscape of the realm.

In the past, there had indeed been ambitious individuals who fancied themselves peerless geniuses and attempted to challenge the Immortal Temple's status after acquiring formidable strength, only to be effortlessly suppressed by the powerhouses of the Immortal Temple.

This time, with over a thousand "World Cities" losing contact, the Immortal Temple viewed it merely as yet another instance of some ignorant upstart attempting to challenge their authority.

Consequently, over fifty Immortal spirits were dispatched to investigate the anomalies occurring in that region.

At their head was even a powerhouse who had attained the status of a侯封 (侯级/Marquee-tier) Immortal.

However, facing a mechanical legion numbering in the millions, this level of strength was no different from offering oneself up on a platter.

Jiang Chen had not even received the notification when Jarvis, monitoring via satellite and detecting that the Immortal Temple's vanguard was attempting to leave the Ancient God Ruins and head toward his "territory," directly mobilized the mechanical legion to intercept and ambush them, completely annihilating the entire contingent.

Nevertheless, Jarvis still chose to awaken Jiang Chen from his meditation.

In Jarvis's judgment, this event constituted a "major matter" serious enough to warrant interrupting Jiang Chen's cultivation.

Upon receiving Jarvis's report, Jiang Chen furrowed his brows slightly.

Yet the furrow instantly smoothed out as he muttered to himself, "Choosing to set up operations near the Ancient God Ruins, I knew this day would eventually come, didn't I?"

"Since the Immortal Temple has already made its move, let us go to war!"

There was even a hint of anticipation within Jiang Chen's tone.

After instructing Jarvis to immediately prepare for war, Jiang Chen walked directly to the adjoining room and woke Luo Feng from his cultivation.

"I am about to go to war with the Immortal Temple, and this place is no longer safe. If you wish to continue cultivating, you had better relocate elsewhere—at the very least, leave the vicinity of the Ancient God Ruins. Better yet, leave the Blood Lokha World entirely."

Jiang Chen succinctly explained the current situation to Luo Feng.

"Go to war with the Immortal Temple?" Luo Feng's eyes widened. "I've heard that the Immortal Temple is the most powerful faction in the Blood Lokha World, boasting massive groups of Immortal-tier powerhouses! Go to war with them?!"

"Haven't you always been curious about my strength? If you're interested, I can let you witness it. But you must promise me not to step onto the battlefield yourself. For you, getting involved in combat of this caliber is still far too early." Jiang Chen did not mind letting Luo Feng observe.

As the saying goes, returning home in glory without letting others see is like wearing broidered garments in the dark.

Since he possessed the strength, what fun would it be not to show off in front of a close friend?

Seeing Jiang Chen's confident demeanor, Luo Feng's curiosity was thoroughly piqued. He wanted to see what trump cards Jiang Chen possessed that gave him the audacity to wage war against a faction of the Immortal Temple's scale, and immediately requested permission to watch.

"Follow me to the base; it's not safe here."

Jiang Chen called out, directly summoning his spaceship and bringing Luo Feng back to the base.

Along the way, the sights across the various resource extraction zones left Luo Feng utterly dumbfounded.

The entire landscape had been scraped away layer by layer; mineral tunnels plunging tens of thousands of kilometers deep were everywhere, with countless engineering machinery and spaceships moving in and out, constantly mining and expanding the caverns at a rate visible to the naked eye.

And upon arriving at the command base, surrounded and guarded by the "arms factories," the scene brimming with heavy industrial aesthetics caused Luo Feng to drop his jaw in astonishment, his chin nearly hitting the floor.

"Such production efficiency! The things being manufactured over there... those are the E9-grade mechas you were selling in the secret realm previously, right?! Such high efficiency? It must be churning out at least several thousand units a day!"

Babata shrieked frantically.

Even Babata, who had lived for millions of years, traveled the universe alongside Callan, and considered himself widely knowledgeable, had never witnessed such a terrifying spectacle.

"Several thousand units? If you're only looking at that single production sector you just saw, then yes, pretty much," Jiang Chen nodded, shifting the topic. "However, that sector is only one among many. If calculated based on total production capacity and under conditions of adequate resource supply, based on Earth's twenty-four-hour day, we can manufacture over one hundred thousand [Gundam] mechas daily. Of course, current resources are prioritized for engineering machinery dedicated to mining, so Gundam production hasn't reached maximum capacity yet; the actual daily output is only about thirty thousand units."

"Over one hundred thousand units a day?! If I recall correctly, you sell those things for thousands to tens of thousands of World Principles Units apiece," Babata exclaimed. "Calculating at an average of ten thousand World Principles Units each, doesn't that mean you rake in tens of billions of World Principles Units every single day?!"

"Nothing of the sort," Jiang Chen couldn't help complaining. "The bestsellers are the basic models equipped with close-combat weapons, priced at only eight hundred World Principles Units, and their production cost is several hundred World Principles Units as well, leaving very little profit. Besides, even if we maxed out production capacity every day, where on earth would we get that many resources?! Even the geniuses from the five great giants' core secret realms couldn't digest such massive output. After tossing about for so long, I've only sold a few thousand units in total. The most expensive, highest-profit top-tier versions haven't been sold even once."

Not every genius possessed vast fortunes to spend on technological weaponry, nor did every genius enjoy using technological weaponry.

There were quite a few geniuses who believed that "only power belonging strictly to oneself is reliable."

The money Jiang Chen had earned over decades of business from these core geniuses couldn't be called a small sum, but compared to his harvests within quest worlds, it truly paled in significance.

"That's still terrifying enough..." Babata sighed. "Back in the Black Dragon Mountain Empire, you were already in the combat mecha business. Looking at it now, you truly excel at this!"

During their conversation, the group had already arrived inside the base's main control hall.

The main control hall itself was housed within a massive structure measuring ten kilometers across in length, width, and height, yet the actual hall inside was only about the size of a soccer field.

In reality, this "building" was a massive super quantum brain.

Only a super quantum brain of this caliber could provide the immense computational power required to support Jarvis in accurately commanding hundreds of billions of mechanical units.

Ordinary auxiliary quantum brains in the universe were sufficient for standard powerhouses, but for Jiang Chen, who wielded such an enormous mechanical legion, they fell catastrophically short.

Naturally, this was also related to Jarvis's "intelligence level."

For instance, certain powerhouses of the Mechanical Race possessed internal components for computation and storage that were not particularly large, yet could execute astronomical volumes of data calculation.

A Universe Master of the Mechanical Race could even use its own computational power to sustain the operation of the entire Virtual Universe.

Jarvis's intelligence level was far from reaching that tier, and it could only crudely and simply enhance its computing power by adding storage and computational modules, thereby scaling up the volume of mechanical units it could control.

Stepping into the main control center, Jarvis's projection immediately manifested in the center of the hall.

"Master," Jarvis bowed slightly in salutation, gesturing toward the massive screen mounted on the side wall of the hall. "You've arrived just in time. Regarding our next course of action, I require your instructions."

(End of Chapter)