Chapter 25: War?

“Doesn’t seem like there’s much left, can I leave early?” Mo Qingqing asked with a yawn.

“No. To be exact… you can’t leave.” Lin Mo said as she tossed out a card.

On it, two words were written in fresh blood.

[War]

The gathering place had been discovered once again.

“Heh.” Mo Qingqing let out an exasperated laugh.

“Which lunatic is it this time?”

“It’s the Dominator taking the initiative.”

“…Su Yun, you can’t say bad things about the Dominator!” Mo Qingqing immediately pinched Su Yun’s small mouth.

Su Yun: “?”

Whatever.

“The reason is to take revenge for the previous ambush, and according to Fate’s guidance, the second Dominator belonging to us will be born in this war.”

Mo Qingqing let go of Su Yun.

Envy.

Envy radiating from her very bones.

But suddenly, another problem occurred to her.

“It can’t be the Dominator of Life, right?”

Wouldn’t that be a total disaster?

“I don’t know, and besides, the practitioners of the Law of Life are still far behind. There’s not even a single Origin Holder yet, so you don’t need to worry.”

“Hoo…” Mo Qingqing let out a breath of relief.

“And you haven’t officially started studying the Laws anyway. Even if someone else takes Life, you can still change.” Lin Mo said.

The ones who should really be worried were those Origin Holders.

The causality surrounding Dominators was too great. Even the Origin Holder of Fate could only deduce that a Dominator would be born.

But exactly which one…

No one knew.

“The reason I brought you here is because you’re hard to kill right now, and you can witness the birth of a Dominator with your own eyes.” As Lin Mo spoke, she assembled a staff.

The staff was quite peculiar.

Calling it a staff was a stretch—it looked more like a water pipe inlaid with a pocket watch.

“The war will begin in four hours. For now, eat and drink if you need to. When the fighting starts, just run to the rear. You’re only a mid-tier mage, not much use.”

Lin Mo’s words weren’t the nicest, but every one of them showed concern.

“War, huh…” Mo Qingqing sighed.

She’d only heard of it before.

Back then, there weren’t many Origin Holders in the first war, and even fewer transcendants.

They got caught completely off guard.

The rules Dominator was so furious they almost lost all dignity as a Dominator.

It’s a bit… nerve-wracking.

War…

Su Yun’s ears drooped instantly.

She had personally witnessed more than one war.

Corpses everywhere, wails echoing across the wilderness…

I need to run…

Absolutely have to run!

But before she could think up an excuse to make Mo Qingqing leave—

Mo Qingqing had already focused her attention on her.

“How’s your Shadow Step coming along? Show me.”

“Eh?… Yes…”

Su Yun froze for a moment, then hurriedly began casting.

In no time, she melted into the shadows.

Mo Qingqing frowned at the patch of darkness.

She stretched out her slender finger, and a layer of shadow magic slowly coiled around it.

With a gentle flick, the shadow magic lashed the patch of darkness like a whip.

“Ugh…” Su Yun let out a pained whimper, losing focus and getting ejected from the shadows.

“Go deeper.”

“…Yes…” Su Yun rubbed her fluffy little head and cast Shadow Step again.

This time, the shadow showed no more flaws.

“Very good. When the fighting starts, just hide in the shadows. Just pay attention to those in black robes.”

“Yes…”

“I’m lending you all of these for now. When the time comes, just watch for dropped equipment and collect it.” As she spoke, Mo Qingqing handed all her storage devices to Su Yun.

“Good idea. I’ll leave mine with you too.” Lin Mo’s eyes lit up as she took out her spatial ring and recorded Su Yun’s aura into it.

“Don’t worry too much about the Elemental Church. Focus on the fallen witches and sorcerers—collect the bodies first, then strip their clothes off in the shadows, and toss the corpses back out.”

Honestly, the items at auction were nothing compared to what those old fogies had hidden away.

With the opportunity to ascend to godhood on the line, all the old monsters would go mad.

Especially those connected to war, death, life, soul, or emotion.

But Lin Mo’s leisurely demeanor made it seem like she wasn’t planning on fighting for that chance to become a god at all.

She was always laid-back, never showing the mania the other Origin Holders had.

Mo Qingqing had asked about it.

But Lin Mo only answered,

“I’m a practitioner of Time, after all…”

Such a response left Mo Qingqing utterly baffled.

Su Yun didn’t care about any of that.

She just stared at the storage items in her hand, feeling utterly hopeless.

Did this mean she had to run right into the heart of the war?

Her lips moved, but in the end, she didn’t dare say a word.

They wanted her to go into the thick of battle to scavenge corpses?

How was that any different from sending her to die?

Those fallen witches and sorcerers—weren’t they all legendary figures in life, capable of overturning the skies with a wave of their hand?

Where they fell, the laws would clash most violently, and the energy would be a raging meat grinder.

She was just a lowly level 16 fox with barely any abilities.

She couldn’t even withstand the shockwaves of their battles, yet she was supposed to sneak in under the noses of those powerhouses and strip the dead…

That’s not how it goes in the novels!

You’re supposed to take me and flee, then, after realizing you can’t get away, you take me along to hide. Eventually, you find a corpse blasted to the edge of the battlefield.

Then we loot the body together and watch the show.

Not just running off and leaving me to sneak into the most dangerous place and steal loot from under all the bigshots’ noses.

How was that any different from directly provoking them?

That’s not how it’s written in the stories…

Su Yun was frantic but dared not show it at all.

Though she was utterly unwilling, in the end, she could only let out a miserable sigh.

“Yes…”

Mo Qingqing nodded with satisfaction, seemingly oblivious to the terror overflowing from Su Yun.

She turned and sat on the sofa, quietly waiting.

After Lin Mo finished assembling the staff, she too closed her eyes to rest.

Only Su Yun, nervous, kept glancing out the window over and over.

Many attendants and mages were already packing up the buildings with metal cubes.

Time ticked by, minute after minute.

Before long, the three of them were forced to stand on a vast stretch of wasteland.

Then a gentle voice sounded.

“Spatial mages, be ready—the enemy’s multi-element saturation barrage is about to hit.”

“Please join forces to establish a giant spatial gate between the wooden stakes.”

*****

“It’s coming,” Lin Mo said, waving her staff to test its balance.

“I’m sure you’ve all heard the news by now. That’s right, the second Dominator will be born today.”

“So this battle won’t follow the usual formation-against-formation pattern.”

“It’ll be tough…”

“But—everyone for themselves!”

Survive.

Or die.

Or… become a new god!

“It’s coming.”

As soon as the words fell, a suffocating sense of pressure swept in from ahead.

The small world trembled on the verge of collapse.

It seemed that something outside was furiously assaulting the world’s barrier.

But the massive transparent teleportation gate was already in place.

Like an invisible net, it silently awaited the arrival of its great prey.