“Are you the City Lord?”
“I think I am.”
Under the blazing sun that hung high in the sky, the air shimmered with heat over the endless expanse of yellow earth. A colossal steel behemoth rumbled across the wilderness, churning up a dust storm that blotted out the sky. From within a cramped room of less than five square meters came this brief exchange.
Qi Honglang, the logistics officer of the mobile city ‘Deep Blue’, stared impassively at the frail yet strangely imposing slave before him. “Proof?”
Facing the skepticism, Jiang Zhixu pulled a loaf of bread from his tattered clothes. He held it up to the weak overhead light, illuminating the green mold spots. “Do you know how many gold coins this bread is worth now?”
Without waiting for an answer, he revealed it himself: “Fifty gold coins! A full fifty gold coins! That old bastard, because the city’s grain yield can no longer feed over nine hundred people, he plans to starve a batch of us to death.”
Qi Honglang’s expression remained unmoved. “So what? He’s the City Lord. He controls this city. All the soldiers obey him. The lives of all the slaves are his. What, you want to start an uprising?”
“Uprising? Ha! Well said! You didn’t use the word ‘rebellion’, which means you—”
“Don’t you dare slander me!”
“Don’t you want to?”
“Want my ass! Get away from me, don’t get blood on me!” Qi Honglang shoved Jiang Zhixu hard and turned to rush out the door. “I’m going to report you.”
A tremendous force slammed into him. Jiang Zhixu’s body had been starved to death; he couldn’t resist at all. His lower back smashed against the sharp corner of a sheet-metal wardrobe, the excruciating pain making him gasp sharply.
He watched Qi Honglang charge out the door, yet felt no urgency.
Because—
Qi Honglang, facing away from the room, was backing up step by step.
Before him, over a dozen ragged, emaciated slaves had gathered, each holding sharpened scrap metal or steel pipes.
“You’re just a bunch of slaves! Rebelling with him means certain death!” Qi Honglang snarled in a low voice.
Then, Jiang Zhixu’s figure emerged from the room’s shadows, still holding that moldy loaf of bread.
Instantly, all eyes were drawn to it.
“This one loaf of bread is worth 50 gold coins. But here with me—”
[Target: Common White Bread]
[Type: Quantity Crit]
[Talent Activating…]
[Activation Successful. Multiplier: 88x!]
*Clatter!*
Dozens of identical loaves of bread materialized out of thin air, crashing onto the metal floor, tumbling and colliding with the city’s vibrations.
Jiang Zhixu’s voice rang out clearly: “It’s worthless!”
Qi Honglang’s eyes widened instantly. He stared fixedly at the bread, his Adam’s apple bobbing uncontrollably. The slaves’ eyes turned crimson with hunger. Yet, as Jiang Zhixu hadn’t given the order, they suppressed their instincts fiercely, none daring to move.
Only when Jiang Zhixu said, “They fell on the floor, don’t mind it, pick them all up,” did the crowd surge forward like starving wolves, frantically gathering the bread into their arms.
Jiang Zhixu turned, his gaze placid as he looked at the utterly dumbfounded Qi Honglang. “You have only two choices. Join us, or…”
“I’m in!”
Jiang Zhixu paused. “Was that a curse, or a pledge?”
*Thud!*
Qi Honglang answered with action. He threw his arms around Jiang Zhixu’s leg, his expression sincere. “I’ve drifted in this wasteland for ten years, waiting for a leader like you. My life is yours, Commander!, I am willing to serve the City Lord unto death!”
Several days later.
Over two hundred rebels, singing a furious anthem of rebellion, battered open the door to the City Lord’s chamber amidst a hail of gunfire.
As a head with unseeing eyes rolled to the ground…
The dust settled.
…
The twenty-meter-tall mobile city stood still upon the yellow earth. Its hull was welded from steel plates of uneven thickness, layered with patches new and old, its surface scarred with scratches and shallow pits. Beneath the city were wide caterpillar tracks, sunk deep into the soil. The vehicle’s undercarriage housed a massive vehicle lift platform, while its sides were hung with thick water intake pipes.
On each flank of the city protruded two ordinary cannons with blackened barrels from crude firing ports, alongside four sealed, reserved gun ports covered with steel plates. At the city’s front top was the observation window of the cockpit; the middle section featured the workshop’s exhaust pipes; and at the highest point stood a watchtower equipped with a telescope.
Inside the city—the City Lord’s chamber, the resource warehouse, the cultivation zone, the medical station, the artillery room… Layer upon layer, orderly and structured.
This was the complete appearance of the city Jiang Zhixu had seized—the ‘Deep Blue’. Ugly, crude, yet in this world, it was a sanctuary envied by all.
[Congratulations on assuming the role of the new City Lord of the ‘Deep Blue’. May you forever march forward, toward the stars and the sea!]
Qi Honglang, a few drops of blood—whose, he didn’t know—smeared on his face, stood guard beside Jiang Zhixu, looking at his back with deep respect.
Jiang Zhixu raised a hand to touch the Control Hub, a trace of emotion flickering across his face.
He had been in this world for half a month now. From a slave on the brink of death to a City Lord—it hadn’t been easy. Because he hadn’t relied on sweat or effort.
He had relied on a cheat.
To be precise, he relied on the talent every City Lord awakens. Except, his talent had not only awakened early, it was currently the only God-Tier talent.
——————
[Omni-Crit lv1]
Quality: God-Tier!
Trait: Select a target to perform a ‘Quantity’ or ‘Quality’ crit.
1. When performing a Quantity Crit, the multiplier is randomly between 2-100x.
2. When performing a Quality Crit, the multiplier is randomly between 2-10x.
Description: “Look, this is the Philosopher’s Stone. There’s only one in the entire alchemical universe. *Snap!* Now, there are 101.”
——————
As a God-Tier talent, ‘Omni-Crit’ had many limitations. For example, it could only be used once per day; items that had been critted could not be critted again; items generated by a crit could not be critted again; the target selected for a crit could not exceed the city’s current level…
But this did nothing to diminish the strength of this rule-based talent. Moreover, judging from that “lv1”, it could be upgraded! Jiang Zhixu just hadn’t found the method to upgrade it yet.
“Honglang.”
“Brother Jiang!”
Qi Honglang immediately stepped forward to receive orders.
“What’s the current situation in the city?” Jiang Zhixu turned, his gaze settling on Qi Honglang.
Qi Honglang reported swiftly: “Before the uprising, the total population was 961. Now, 579 remain. The vast majority of the dead were the former City Lord’s men. The ordinary residents inside the city are somewhat fearful and panicked. I’ve assigned many steady-tempered brothers to reassure them. I believe we can stabilize the situation soon.”
As weak, malnourished slaves, their casualty ratio had been extremely low—not because the slaves were strong fighters, but because the other side surrendered too quickly. The old bastard’s loyalists had been living the high life; they weren’t willing to die easily! However, after taking the prisoners, Jiang Zhixu had ordered them all executed.