"Sir God."
At that moment, Li Xiao raised his head, eyes sharp, gaze unwavering, and he spoke his wish directly, without hesitation: "I… I hope to destroy the state of Chen and restore the glory of the Tang state once more."
Yes. That was it. His wish was clear, simple, yet burning with fury. He would destroy Chen Guo.
After all… Chen Guo was the one who had ruined his family, stolen his rightful place as prince, and shattered his identity, piece by piece. That hatred, that humiliation… it had never been shared, never diluted, and it simmered in his chest constantly. Revenge—long sought, long nurtured—was now within reach.
And if the Chen Kingdom were annihilated, he could rebuild Tang anew, claim the throne, the authority, the glory. At that moment… wouldn't all the wealth, all the beauty, all that intoxicating honor belong solely to him? Wouldn't it rise like clouds above his head, brilliant, untouchable, eternal?
There was no doubt, in his mind, that this wish was… the most practical. Compared to immortality, compared to ethereal desires, this was equivalent. Balanced. Achievable.
"Destroy Chen Country?!"
Xia Chuan's lips curved in the faintest smile. He had already absorbed all relevant knowledge from the Book of Wisdom. Tang and Chen… centuries of conflict, bitter enmity stretching across generations, a feud that had never ended. And Li Xiao, chased to this place, hunted across lands and rivers… all because of Chen Guo.
The hatred was obvious. Tangible. His fury could practically be measured in the air, in the trembling of his body.
For Xia Chuan, the wish was trivial.
Chen State was vast, teeming with hundreds of millions, yet to him, Xia Chuan, an ancient giant whose power surpassed imagination, it was like stepping on a nest of ants. Crushing, simple, inevitable. Compared to intangible dreams like immortality, to him, this wish… was almost laughably easy.
And more, there was practical gain. Chen Guo possessed a world item of his own. If the Chen Kingdom were destroyed, Xia Chuan could claim it. Kill two birds with one stone… no, more like hundreds, thousands, with a single flick.
"Very well," Xia Chuan's voice echoed, calm, omnipotent, carrying into the deepest reaches of Li Xiao's mind, "I understand your wish."
"What?!"
Li Xiao and the others froze. No one had expected the ancient god to not only hear, but agree, respond… recognize. Their minds spun, disbelief nearly unbalancing their knees, their breaths caught in their throats.
But joy was quick to replace shock. Ecstasy radiated like a storm. With the support of the ancient god… surely, the Chen Kingdom could not withstand them.
Before anyone could speak again, Xia Chuan vanished.
"What just… happened? Why did Sir God disappear?"
"Doesn't matter. He will destroy Chen Country himself, of course."
"What now? What should we do?"
"Return. Immediately. To Tang State. Mobilize the troops. Counterattack. Retake what is ours."
Discussion buzzed, quick, urgent, yet trivial. All knew instinctively what to do. And so, they began the journey back to Tang.
...
Meanwhile, Xia Chuan, in an instant, teleported back to Xuan Huang Xing through the bronze door. Two bottles of liquid nitrogen appeared in his hands, snatched from his home laboratory, then, just as instantly, he returned. One second, barely.
For humans, annihilating hundreds of millions alone… impossible. Impossible. But humans never relied solely on brute strength. The truest power lay in intellect, in cunning, in tools. And Xia Chuan… never wasted personal force lightly.
"Liquid nitrogen… should do the trick."
He tapped his chin, regarding the two frosty bottles.
Liquid nitrogen. Modern civilization distilled into cold, lethal simplicity. A substance that could freeze, destroy, annihilate. At -196°C, a single cubic meter expands into 696 cubic meters of nitrogen gas at room temperature. Touch the skin… and it burns with frostbite in seconds. Irreversible.
Release it over the ground, and even a region, a city… a miniature kingdom, could be encased in ice, immobilized, destroyed. Ants, humans, armies alike—nothing escaped.
The price? Minimal. Easily acquired. Used even in ice cream production. One liter, five to ten yuan. One ton, at most a thousand dollars. Cheap, deadly, perfect. Two bottles… and a nation of miniature humans, annihilated.
Xia Chuan smiled faintly, cold calculation in his eyes. Two bottles. Wipe them out. Done. The ultimate efficiency. Power and practicality, hand in hand.
"Where is Chen Guo?"
He asked the Book of Wisdom. Knowledge, like blood through veins, flowed into him. An encyclopedia of the world, omnipotent, omniscient. Anything, anywhere, immediately known.
"Master… three thousand kilometers ahead."
Immediately, a three-dimensional map formed, vivid, exact, in Xia Chuan's mind.
"I see."
Three thousand kilometers for miniature humans. For him, walking, it was barely several hundred meters. Ten minutes, perhaps less, and he would arrive.
Whoosh!
Without pause, without hesitation, he strode forward, walking swiftly toward Chen Guo.