The Duke of Jinlihua, his face devoid of color, spoke with cold indifference: "I have just slain your son. If you are a man, pick up the curved saber your son left behind and duel me! Hey, hey, old fat white man, duel me like a true nobleman!"

The face of the Duke of Jinlihua darkened, and he stared at 》Kan Hua in horror, his body trembling violently. His lips quivered slightly, repeating only in a constant murmur: "My son, O’Dowd... my only son... the sole heir to the family... my O'Dowd! Why did you challenge a demon?"

"Correct, but no bonus points!" 》Kan Hua triumphantly pointed at his own chest, laughing maniacally as he spat out a thick plume of smoke: "I am a demon, a true demon, a demon who crawls out of coffins to suck the blood of fair-skinned young girls! Hey, old fellow, do you dare to duel me?" The Duke of Jinlihua, trembling, managed to rise from the ground. Gu Xichen couldn't help but admire his courage for standing up to the maniacal 》Kan Hua. His right hand fumbled hesitantly at his waist, and after a moment, the Duke produced a lightsaber. With a clumsy movement, he pressed a button on the weapon. Accompanied by a faint charging sound, a milky-white, saber-like weapon, about a meter long, materialized in the Duke's hand.

Gasping for breath, the Duke of Jinlihua took several rapid steps toward 》Kan Hua.

》Kan Hua shouted in delighted surprise: "Yay, yay, yay? You really have guts! Don't worry, I'll give you a complete corpse!"

The Duke of Jinlihua's face twisted in agony. He shrugged off the two middle-aged men supporting him and swung the lightsaber forward savagely: "In the name of the Duke of Jinlihua, I command you to destroy this evil demon! He is a demon, a demon! All soldiers, obey the order, destroy this damned demon! He used dark arts to kill my child!"

"That assessment doesn't unjustly condemn 》Kan Hua in the least!" Gu Xichen chuckled with schadenfreude.

The base already housed thirteen hundred soldiers, and when the Duke of Jinlihua and other nobles arrived, they brought over five thousand accompanying guards. Upon hearing the Duke's command, all the soldiers simultaneously raised their firearms and aimed at 》Kan Hua. However, the terrifying scene of Fenghua instantly crushing O’Dowd into pulp was still swirling in their minds. Although the muzzles of thousands of soldiers were aimed at him, not a single one dared to fire. Instead, the barrels of all their weapons shook violently, and some soldiers even began backing away.

"Incompetent soldiers!" Fuya.Ming fiercely gripped Gu Xichen's arm, tearing at his flesh with force, and hissed angrily in a low voice: "Useless trash, weak as sheep! Mr. Gu, can you capture these nobles? I need them to hand over command of the soldiers to me!" "Ducat, commence!" Gu Xichen snapped his fingers immediately.

A silver beam shot out from Ducat's eyes, extending several feet. He let out a low roar.

The one hundred armed robots parked outside the base instantly activated. They lunged with bared metal teeth toward the thick main entrance gate of the base, using sheer force to tear the entire structure down. With a deep, heavy crash, the meter-thick metal portal fell to the ground, and the one hundred armed robots surged in with roars. "Destruction, slaughter, great Master, your will is our command, we destroy!"

Wuuuuu^^" The multi-barreled energy cannons on the robots' right arms spun rapidly, their power suppressed to the absolute minimum. A rain of light, capable only of stunning but not truly harming anyone, poured from the muzzles. Thousands of panicked soldiers inside the base shrieked as massive waves of them convulsed and fell under the barrage of energy fire. Their terrified screams scattered them like ducks startled by thunder; they dropped their weapons in panic and ran everywhere.

My god, these are demons from hell! One hundred such massive robots—what terrifying engines of war, what reapers of souls! The soldiers shrieked, surging like a tide from one side of the base to the other, and with a dense sweep of fire, they surged back from the other side to this one. Then, all the soldiers collapsed onto the ground, convulsing wildly, foaming at the mouth. This included the original thirteen hundred soldiers inside the base—every single soldier lay prone, none escaping.

The lightsaber in the Duke of Jinlihua's hand was still held aloft, frozen. He looked helplessly at the densely packed, fallen royal soldiers, screaming in utter despair: "Impossible! These are the kingdom's most elite warriors, the strongest fighting force in the realm! Demons, you devils!"

Daring not to look at 》Kan Hua, whose face wore an evil grin from the execution platform, the Duke of Jinlihua sharply spun around and aimed the lightsaber at Gu Xichen, who appeared refined, ethereal, and possessed the demeanor of a detached master. Since achieving the Innate Body, Gu Xichen gave off a feeling like an empty bamboo stalk—no sense of overwhelming power, or rather, no intensely strong presence. The Duke of Jinlihua instinctively judged Gu Xichen to be the softer target.

"Demon, a duel. Bah! I stake the honor of the House of Jinlihua on it, let us duel! If I fail, my blood will splatter on your... and be placed alongside the bone armor of the great Toothed Whale I captured last year!" The Duke's declaration of war was almost identical to his son's.

"Be careful!" Fuya.Ming instinctively grabbed Gu Wuchen’s hand, murmuring in alarm: "The lightsaber in the Duke of Jinlihua's hand is the work of the Star Alliance’s most famous lightsaber crafting master. It can pierce the armor of a Star Alliance Tier-One battleship in a single strike!"

"I will be careful!" Gu Wuchen gently patted Fuya.Ming's small hand. The contact was smooth as the finest silk, her cool skin like the finest mutton-fat jade. Fuya.Ming suddenly paused, quickly releasing the grip on Gu Xichen's arm.

"Heh heh, you truly have courage!" Traces of purple strange light slowly seeped from Gu Xichen's eyes, and an aura, profound and indescribably mysterious, surged around him. This aura was like the feeling children have on a summer night, gazing up at the starry canopy and being stunned by the greatness of the cosmos and time. Boundless and majestic, enveloped by this presence, the Duke of Jinlihua felt like an ant in a vast ocean, capable of being crushed by a single wave.

"No... no..." The Duke of Jinlihua suddenly realized he had sought the wrong opponent for the duel.

Gu Xichen walked leisurely toward the Duke of Jinlihua. Though his steps seemed slow, he reached his opponent in a single stride. With a light pat, the lightsaber in the Duke's hand fell into Gu Wuchen’s grasp. He tossed the weapon casually toward Ducat: "Xiao, examine this thing. The best craftsmanship from the Star Alliance's master smiths—can you replicate it?"

Ducat snatched the hilt of the saber, smiling faintly: "If it's in my hands, I can certainly replicate it." He possessed the confidence born of genuine ability.

Looking down upon the sweaty, plump, trembling Duke of Jinlihua, Gu Wuchen said mildly: "A duel?"

"No!" The Duke of Jinlihua shook his head firmly, as resolute as if confirming his manhood.

"Then, you will obey my every command, and perhaps I can spare your life!" Gu Xichen pressed one palm onto the execution platform beside him. A silent palm print, three feet deep, appeared on the purplish-green circular stage. The Duke of Jinlihua, all the assembled nobles, and even Fuya.Ming, who stood nearby, were stunned. The execution platform was forged from the sturdiest alloy developed by the Yafeike Kingdom, and no one had ever heard of anyone leaving even the slightest mark on it with bare hands, let alone an impression this deep! This was beyond human capability.

The Duke of Jinlihua nodded repeatedly with resolute determination: "I will obey everything you say! Esteemed Sir, you must hail from a powerful royal lineage; would you accept my fealty?" He smiled obsequiously.

Gu Xichen remained silent, shaking his head lightly. Just as Fuya.Ming had observed, the Yafeike Kingdom was rotten to its core! Turning around, Gu Xichen's sharp gaze swept over the trembling clusters of nobles. All the nobles immediately clamored: "We will obey you completely, esteemed Sir, we will obey you completely!"

Without further ado, Gu Xichen handed the entire group of nobles over to Fuya.Ming. Fuya.Ming promptly promised Gu Xichen several tons of Starlight Silver as payment, and she also guaranteed that Gu Xichen would always be welcome to purchase various items from her using this Starlight Silver—even potentially purchasing the Yafeike Kingdom's scientific research data! What followed was inevitable: supported by Gu Xichen's overwhelming military might, the nobles of the Yafeike Kingdom reluctantly ordered the mobilization of every soldier under their command, directing all of them to the mountainous area where Fuya.Ming's headquarters was located.

Then came another event that caused Fuya.Ming’s complexion to change drastically: the armies mobilized by these hundred-plus Yafeike nobles totaled over three hundred and fifty thousand men, not the one hundred and fifty thousand Fuya.Ming had been informed of. Clearly, these commanding nobles had set an ambush for Fuya.Ming regarding the number of troops under their banner.

Moreover, accompanying these soldiers were sixty-five Tier-Two battleships, each four thousand meters long, and even three powerful battleships meeting the standard of Star Alliance Tier-One vessels, ranging from six to seven thousand meters in length! Fuya.Ming was trembling with fury. She slammed her fist down on the command console before her and roared in anger: "This is the nobility of Yafeike! This is the supposedly elite of this decaying kingdom! Two hundred thousand private troops not listed on any military roster, sixty-eight battleships unknown to the Kingdom! Bastards, you are all bastards!"

Pointing furiously at the shivering nobles gathered in the command hall, Fuya.Ming launched into a torrent of ancestral greetings, the brilliance of her invective leaving Gu Xichen speechless. Not a single curse word was uttered; even at the peak of her rage, Fuya.Ming refused to use vulgarities, yet her tirade was enough to make the ancestors of these nobles leap from their graves in anger! If they possessed the latent potential of 》Kan Hua, they certainly would have!"

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