Chapter 15

In Xuan’s analysis, seizing or directly requesting energy stones from the elves were foolish. It would lower the movie characters’ affection toward them, especially the main characters. Zheng had saved them multiple times in the previous battles. The energy stones alone were not worth it.

“Rather than obtaining the energy stones, it’s better to treat them as a warehouse. We don’t need to obtain the energy stones in a hurry. Remember that every team can return to their movie worlds after completion of a movie without meeting other teams. We only have to build our relationship with the elves right now. Then we can use items from God’s dimension to exchange the specialties of this world. Energy stones, mithril and other rare items. There is no point to be greedy here. Our current goal is obtaining influence and not waste the opportunity of entering this world early.”

Everyone understood this was the case with them. Their biggest enemies were the increased difficulty movie characters, the large amount of minions, and the two teams waiting for them. It wasn’t the time to be greedy about the energy stones. Though, everyone still glanced at the energy stones during their rest. The elves were more than luxurious.

The players had free time at night. After a little talk, they decided to go around the city split by teams. They wanted to see if they could discover bonus missions or quest items in the city. There was nothing else to do anyway. Walking around could also be a kind of relaxation.

The three teams were safe inside the city. On the other side, the seventeen newbies accompanied by seven veterans moved along the main roads leading to the Gap of Rohan. This group’s strength was worrisome but the One Ring was not on them. They had reached west to the Gap of Rohan. The territory belonged to both humans and elves so the way had been safe for them.

Since they were following the normal path, it would take forty days to go from Rivendell to the Gap of Rohan. Or thirty days if they were to rush through. The sceneries on the way had been picturesque. There was no such a thing as environmental pollution or removed forests in this world. The scenes attracted the newbies and gave them a sense of being in a travel.

The veterans on the other hand had their hearts clenched the whole time. The weakest of the group was a man from team Northern Ice Land. He only survived three movies but he knew there was no such a thing as a peaceful world. It might seem peaceful now but death could come without any indication.

Kampa and the others from team China had a fever on the way. The fever came and went fast. After it was over, they reached the first unlocked stage. The prototype T virus Xuan manufactured came into effect. There was some delay but the effect of unlocking the first stage was there. The members of team China gained increased strength and reaction speed. The increase wasn’t as noticeable as the dragon blood though.

Haotian contacted the veterans of team China five days after they began the journey. He dragged them to the field then said with a smile. “It’s a little troublesome but let me introduce myself again. The God and Xian Thieves. I am the Xian, Haotian. Ahem. You don’t seem to know me.”

They looked at him with a frown. Haotian felt the awkwardness and laughed. “I specialize at stealing valuable items in the real world. Everything from antiques, animals, technology, and even humans. As long as they were valuable and difficult to obtain, they were my targets. I worked with a party in the real world.”

Gando sounded like he didn’t care. “Oh, so what does it have to do with us? No matter how powerful you are in the real world, you will still struggle to survive here. Being a thief won’t make you become powerful here.”

“That’s not what I meant.” Haotian scratched his head then he laughed. “I was just introducing myself again. What I want to say is Xuan gave us a task.”

Their expressions instantly changed. Especially Gando who was a victim to Xuan’s schemes and almost died if Zheng didn’t backed him in Starship Troopers.

“The task is…” Haotian recalled when Xuan first talked to him. Xuan called out the name of his group and his real name. His heart skipped a beat right there. If he wasn’t in such a situation, he would have attempted to kill Xuan.

“It’s not necessary to feel such hostility toward me. You wouldn’t have forgotten that Section 9 of the National Security has your data? I coincidentally had the authority and habit to read the data there. So I am familiar with you. You are the an genetically engineered human created one and a half year after the first generation of genetically engineered humans. The facility didn’t vainly hope for a evolution being surpassing all human limits like the first time. The second generation only had the necessary genetics modified. Unfortunately, the mortality rate was still high. You are one of the twenty that survived and the only one without negative side effects.”

Haotian examined him then said with an apathetic tone. “Who are you? I give you thirty seconds.”

“The only survivor of the first generation of genetically engineered humans. My name is Chu Xuan.”

Haotian’s DNA only had two modifications, intelligence and psychokinesis. The purpose of his modifications was to give him sufficient intelligence and combat ability. He was the only one in his generation that lived more than twenty years due to the lack of side effects. Haotian was created to steal the heirlooms that belonged to China, information that was traded in the underground, and technology. These acts couldn’t be brought to the surface so his name wasn’t anywhere in the official records of the government. He was a person with no history. The only indication of his origin was inside a notebook within Section 9.

“Due to your intelligence and ability, the only support we provided you was information. Yet, you completed numerous tasks that were supposedly impossible. We later learned that you had a partner. The God and Xian thieves, You are the Xian, so you named yourself Haotian, which means the emperor of Xian. Then who’s Adam? The person known as the ancestor of gods. What is his origin?” Xuan said without emotion.

Haotian replied with a bitter smile. “Our rule was to never ask each other’s origin. I can’t believe it’s you, Colonel Chu Xuan. Can’t believe you also entered this world. You are the only person aside from Adam that I respect from the bottom of my heart after the cooperations we had. I might have died if it wasn’t for your plans.”

Xuan nodded. “I have two questions. One, Adam’s whereabout. Two, how did you come here. You can lie but it should be impossible for you to enter this realm with your personality and body. Tell me. How did you do it?”

Haotian scratched his head. “I entered here while I was chasing Adam. He suddenly disappeared into thin air. It was inside a concealed room. A truly concealed room with no tricks. I couldn’t figure out how he left the room even if he had intelligence that rivals you. So I investigated the room he disappeared in. There was a laptop on the floor.”

“Then?”

Haotian said. “I watched the surveillance videos of that room. He had the bizarre habit of observing his own behaviors. I saw that he clicked on a YES on the screen before he disappeared. I attempted to search for the program but there was no traces left. Then I searched for similar cases from governments over the world. And finally I found your message inside the database of China’s biggest military base. You asked Adam’s whereabout, are you looking to kill him?”

Xuan nodded. “Correct. It’s risky to let such a dangerous person live. I am going to tell you my plan. You have to…”

“That’s basically the situation. Ahem. Why did I copy that ice man. Anyway, this is Xuan’s plan. We have to choose whether we want to proceed with it.” Haotian smiled.

The other four people gave him a weird expression. Gando said. “What do you mean we can choose? Do you have anything against the man? We are of course going to proceed with his plan. The plan seems like it has a high chance of success too. Why are you asking such question?”

“Asking such question?” Haotian giggled. He seemed to find it funny. After some time, he said. “You seem to trust Xuan a lot. I never thought someone like him would be worth other people’s trusts. Are you afraid of him scheming you to death?”

Zero and the two others didn’t express anything. Gando said with empathy. “Now that you mention it, it seems that there is indeed a higher chance of him scheming us. Are you a victim too?”

Haotian acted as if he found his soul mate. He grabbed Gando’s hands. “Yes. Did he also scheme you? Haha. You lucky bastard. You’re still alive. Another scourge is born. Haha. Ahem. I mean that everyone understands an officer on the battlefield doesn’t necessarily have to comply with the general. We don’t have to really follow Xuan’s plan to ambush Isen… snipe Saruman.”

Zero said. “You haven’t finishing telling us his plan. Sci-fi weapons have no effect in this world. If we were to snipe Saruman, Heng would be more useful unless there’s a way to let me use the Gauss sniper rifle. Otherwise, I won’t be of much use.”

Haotian brought out a red, long, and slender bullet from his pocket with a smile. It was about the length of a man’s finger. This was a high explosive Gauss sniper bullet except the symbols carved on the shell. They could faintly notice a green light flew along the symbols.

“Xuan gave this to me. He said the bullet can damage movie characters. However, if Saruman used a barrier, we will have to depend on the Eyes of Death Perception.” Haotian laughed. He opened his arms like a salesperson and the people in front were the fools. “What do you think of the plan? Why do we have to complete such a difficult mission? Why don’t we follow a new plan?”

Zero said. “We would rather believe in Xuan instead of believe in you. At least he was never wrong. He had never done anything wrong since I met him, even though he schemes his team. How do you make us trust you, newcomer? How can you convince use to abandon a correct plan and choose one that might be wrong? Even though Xuan assigned you as the leader of this group, it doesn’t mean you surpass him in intelligence.”

Haotian nodded. “You are not wrong. Let us have a bet. If I win, you will follow my plan. If I lose, we will follow Xuan’s plan and I will take on the responsibility of leading you.”

The four of them looked at each other. Zero asked. “A bet on what?”

“Fight. The four of you against me. You can use any weapon aside from Gando going on flight mode with his robot. You can kill me or permanently disable me but I can’t kill you or cause permanent injury to you. I can only subdue you.” Haotian looked at them with seriousness.

Zheng handed them the storage bag before they split up. Xuan also gave WangXia a small energy storage device the size of a fist. It could only store about thirty percent of Zheng’s Qi but that much was enough to activate the storage bag. WangXia still hadn’t cultivated his own Qi but he could drain the Qi from the device and use it temporarily. The bag had all their weapons, a robot, a Gauss sniper rifle, a Gattling cannon, plasma grenades, mines, and timed bombs.

They naturally had to avoid fighting in front of the other veterans and newbies. A few days later when the group came to a never-ending grassy field, the five people from team China made up an excuse and went away into a mountain valley.

“My plan is quite simple. We follow the first half of Xuan’s plan to snipe Saruman. However, we won’t meet up with their group afterward. Xuan wants us to kill Saruman then inject virus into Saruman’s orcs to turn them into Nemesis. We would then bring these Nemesis to back the team up. But no! There’s a critical flaw to this plan. The influence we have at that point would overlap.” Haotian sat on the ground and said.

Tampa, WangXia, and Zero had bruises all over their faces. Gando was lying on the ground convulsing, with bubbles coming out his mouth. Haotian was the only person unharmed.

“Based on my understanding of Xuan, he would definitely try to get his hands on the knights of Rohan. So even if we head over with the orcs, the addition wouldn’t change the situation too much. We would be better off doing something else…”

Gando wiped the bubbles off his mouth. “Like? Have you come up with what exactly you want to do?”

“Of course!” Haotian smiled. He crushed a piece of rock with his hand. “Incorporate Saruman’s orcs into our forces. Then transform them to Nemesis. I mean to transform them in masses. We only need a thousand Nemesis equipped with weapons and armors. This army would be powerful enough to rival an army of fifty thousand orcs. My plan is to ambush team East America and team Celestial from behind. We will be the other group’s saviors. We will be the trump card of team China.”

Tampa rubbed the bruises on his face. He asked. “Didn’t Xuan only produce eighty portions of the virus? How are you going to make a thousand Nemesis?”

Haotian laughed. “You are underestimating that man too much. How can there be only one plan when it’s him? Those eight portions were produced in God’s dimension. But, he has several hundred portions cultivating right now. This isn’t a greenhouse like God’s dimension so the reproduction rate goes down. However, the T virus in the storage bag will finish reproduction by the time we reach Isengard. We may even end up with a surplus of T virus. Anyway, there will be at least five hundred portions. Haha.”

“That’s basically the situation. Isn’t it interesting?” Xuan sat in front of Zheng and said.

Zheng was stunned with his eyes and mouth wide open. He pointed at Xuan but Xuan continued eating his fruit as nothing was wrong. It took Zheng a while before he could speak. “But how could they ambush Isengard with just the few of them? That’s running straight to the enemy base with a white wizard in garrison.”

Xuan nodded. “There won’t be an issue. A normal person’s vision can only reach several thousand meters. He can’t even notice an object the size of him at that distance. And even if he does, it would be merely a small dot. The Gauss sniper rifle has a range of tens of thousands of meters. Zero simply has to stay over ten thousand meters away. His enhanced vision allows him to succeed at this range. As long as they follow my plan, Saruman’s death is inevitable. Even if Saruman survives, they could easily escape with the distance. You don’t have to worry about them.”

Zheng had no choice but to nod. “Fine. We don’t have to worry about them like you said. But I still don’t understand what’s interesting? You have made similar plans in the past. What makes you happy about this one?”

Xuan smiled lightly. “Because Haotian won’t come to support us with the eighty Nemesis as I requested. Based on his personality and behavior, he will request cooperation from Zero and the others. They will incorporate the remaining orcs under Saruman and transform them into Nemesis. The T virus I put in the storage bag is still cultivating. They will mature in thirty days. Haotian should have made this decision by now. That’s what’s interesting. The other four people aren’t familiar with him. So there will be an argument between them. Haotian will use this opportunity to establish his status in the group. That’s the interesting thing.”

Zheng was still confused. “Why? Why do you want him to establish status in the group?”

“To bribe people over…”

Before Xuan could finish talking, a female elf walked down the stairs. She was Galadriel, the lady of Lorien.