Divine Beast Creator

Chapter 2410 - 2411: Desolation

Although most of the passengers on the train had already realized something big was about to happen, only when the Alliance spokesperson made the announcement did they realize things were worse than they’d thought.

A suffocating atmosphere spread through the carriage. Feng Yuan had no intention of trying to stop it; at a time like this, forcing a lively mood would only backfire. Even if they didn’t understand exactly how strong the enemy the Alliance spokesperson mentioned was, the fact that every country and every city was entering a state of high alert was enough to make it clear.

Even if population movement hadn’t been completely banned, such strict restrictions only showed up in tough wartime situations, and now, before the War had even started, things were already like this. Most people couldn’t help feeling uneasy.

Even if the Alliance claimed this was to prevent infiltration by external enemies, who could know whether the Alliance was just trying to comfort them?

"This vibe is really not great."

Sweeping his gaze around, Feng Yuan muttered under his breath. Qi Chen spoke quietly:

"Well, considering the measures they’re taking this time..."

"What can you do? For the Alliance and the various nations, this is a relatively appropriate response. It’s not like they can run checks every few days, right?"

"Agunas wasn’t wrong about one thing—there’s only such a thing as a thief getting a thousand days to steal, not a thousand days to guard against thieves. Since they’re not ready to go straight into full-scale War, this is all they can do for now."

Shrugging, Feng Yuan spoke, then suddenly thought of something and turned to Dou Yanlan:

"Speaking of which, is he going to get called up to join the War too?"

Dou Yanlan froze. At first she thought Feng Yuan meant Qi Chen, but on second thought that was impossible. Qi Chen wasn’t the Qi Chen from the War timeline; drafting him would be meaningless—unless the front line collapsed in an instant.

But no matter how you looked at it, there’s no way something like that would... happen, right?

She spaced out for quite a while before realizing Feng Yuan was referring to that man—the man who had missed so many of her birthdays because of missions.

Even though he was currently employed with the Maomu Special Service Team, he used to be military. Being placed in Maomu Special Service was only because the missions he’d carried out before made it unsuitable for him to return to the regular forces.

If this full-scale War broke out, would they transfer him back? Dou Yanlan didn’t know either.

"No idea. Maybe?"

"Who are you talking about?"

Qi Chen looked at Feng Yuan in confusion. Spreading his hands, Feng Yuan said,

"Who do you think? Who else could it be besides her... ahem, that man?"

"Speaking of which, your dad, would he also..."

Seeing Feng Yuan ask him, Qi Chen scratched his head and said,

"I don’t know about that either, but... probably yeah, given what my dad is like..."

"Need my help? This War isn’t going to be that simple."

"No. If something really does happen, maybe that’s just fate..."

Qi Chen sighed, hesitated a moment, and chose to refuse. If Feng Yuan stepped in, his family wouldn’t have to worry so much, but... he didn’t know how Feng Yuan planned to help—or rather, if that help came at the cost of losing a friend, he... didn’t know how to choose...

"That’s true. If I leave Maomu City and they break in while I’m gone, that’d be bad."

Giving Xiao Ji a light pat, Feng Yuan seemed to give up on his earlier idea. On his phone, the Alliance spokesperson’s speech was still going, but the thoughts of the three of them had long since drifted far away.

"Najia, why won’t you let me take part in this War? Wouldn’t it be great if we stopped those invaders outside the world?"

Yang Hongzhi looked at Najia, puzzled. Najia lowered its head, looking a little embarrassed, and said,

"I... I’m not ready yet..."

"Huh?! Sorry, sorry, I totally ignored how you felt."

"This isn’t your fault. Clearly, we Divine Beasts should be taking part in this War, but I..."

"Sigh, forget it. Doing logistics in the rear isn’t so bad. Besides, we still have to guard the homeland against surprise attacks."

Seeing Najia blaming itself, Yang Hongzhi hurried to speak. He also wanted to charge into the temporal tributary and wipe out those invaders in one go, but without the help of the Divine Beast Najia, Yang Hongzhi simply couldn’t do that.

Unlike Yang Hongzhi, the Divine Beasts standing behind other Divine Pact Makers weren’t afraid of War, but they couldn’t leave their current regions. It wasn’t a rule binding them—it was an agreement among the Divine Beasts themselves.

The Imperial Timeline might have some special methods. To prevent those guys from wreaking havoc on the Main World, they had to stay behind and hold the Main World. As for infiltrating the Imperial Timeline, Agunas actually did have that in mind, but right now it was still conducting investigations in Baiman City, and the Alliance meeting had yet to reach a conclusion.

Divine Beasts going into battle alone wasn’t impossible, but doing so would easily make humans think the Divine Beasts would just take over the whole matter. They didn’t want humans to become dependent on them; even the slightest chance of that was unacceptable.

As the live signal was cut, the Alliance’s official streaming channel, which had dominated the net for so long, finally returned to its original content. But by this point, almost no one was interested in those streams anymore.

Even the streamers themselves hurriedly apologized and logged off. They couldn’t help it; the impact of this news was too big. They hadn’t expected the War to break out so suddenly.

"War, huh... I wonder if there’s another me out there."

When the stream ended, the phone’s video page automatically returned to the home screen, but Qiu Hanmo couldn’t care less. He pinched his chin, thinking about what he could do.

Join the army?

No, that didn’t suit him—or rather, the current military didn’t exactly need someone like him. Then what could he do?

"Hong Zhi and the others must be totally stunned by this news, huh? But it’s not like there’s nothing we can do."

Thinking about the warning the Alliance spokesperson had repeated again and again, Qiu Hanmo already understood what they could do. This wasn’t something he could handle alone. There was no helping it; his own role just wasn’t that of a powerhouse combatant. His Combat Power wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t top tier either.

On a normal day, that might be enough, but in times like this, how different were they students from ordinary people, really?

Except for... that guy who was basically nothing like a student and ridiculously strong—Feng Yuan. Maybe that guy had the power to turn the tide of battle, but they weren’t close, for one thing, and for the plan Qiu Hanmo had in mind next, he didn’t need such high-end combat strength.

"Man, who’d have thought that after going on a little trip, coming back would feel like the whole New Year’s already over."

Stepping out of the high-speed rail station, Feng Yuan stretched lazily as he spoke. The once lively atmosphere had faded; joy had been replaced by heavy solemnity. As they exited the station, Feng Yuan—and, really, every traveler—was required to have their identity checked and verified to confirm they weren’t from the Imperial Timeline.

Outside the station, the usual bustle had turned desolate. Looking at this city that was both familiar and strange, Qi Chen said,

"Just announcing it and raising the control level, and it’s already like this?"

"The initial panic is unavoidable, but as time goes on, people will get used to it. Still, getting back to how lively it was before won’t be that easy."

Surveying the station square, Dou Yanlan muttered to herself. Feng Yuan chuckled and said,

"Alright, let’s go. Head home first. If we keep standing here, the way people look at you is going to get real weird."

Noticing Feng Yuan’s gaze, a middle-aged uncle quickly turned his head away and sighed. Qi Chen hurriedly followed Feng Yuan to catch a ride.

On the way, the holiday decorations still hadn’t been taken down—or rather, Maomu City probably didn’t plan on taking them down. On the streets, people in uniform were carefully inspecting every corner.

The matter of the Runes couldn’t be treated casually. According to the intel from higher up, those Runes were very likely to act as coordinates, allowing the Imperial Timeline to invade directly at the locations where the Runes were placed.

Even if it couldn’t be completely prevented, they still had to do their best to stop them from charging straight into the city.

When they got home, just as Feng Yuan had expected, Qi Chen’s parents had already been waiting for a long time, and even Qi Xiaoshuang, who rarely stayed home, hadn’t gone out. Or rather, at a time like this, how many people could still mindlessly enjoy life?

"Um, Feng Yuan, is this whole thing really that serious?"

Seeing Feng Yuan, Qi Xiaoshuang went right up to him and asked. She just couldn’t really grasp how serious this actually was.

Glancing at Qi Chen’s cold expression, Feng Yuan smiled and said,

"Every region is under lockdown. What do you think? You know exactly how serious it is; you just don’t want to believe it."

"I..."

Qi Xiaoshuang looked at Feng Yuan, then at Qi Chen. She had indeed already guessed this was serious; otherwise the Alliance spokesperson wouldn’t have come out personally, let alone put every city under lockdown.

But she didn’t want to admit it, because if things really were that serious, then her father would...

Shaking his head slightly, Feng Yuan said,

"The line I hate hearing most is ’he’s a hero.’ But you also have to think about what he himself wants. Some things... someone has to do them..."