Chapter 2-5: Companions(V)
Wangxia was this sort of person. He was perhaps the most selfless person in God’s Realm, while the most selfish at the same time. It was hard for him to not be different from the rest since he had entered God’s Realm through hypnosis. He had abandoned safety and the peaceful real world for his country to enter this terrifying and dangerous realm. He may no longer have had even the chance to return, and may also have had a miserable death. After all, there were many horror movie worlds. Apart from natural disaster movies like The Perfect Storm, there were ghosts, Aliens, viruses and so on. Entering this Realm with foreknowledge of this required tremendous courage.
Wangxia was such a man, a man who lacked resentment and regrets. As a soldier, he had his glory and responsibilities, so he trained like crazy. This was all in order for the victory in the final battle and for the possibility of returning to the real world. He had to become stronger for all this!
For some unknown reason, he gradually noticed some changes in his Bomb Dominator ability as his personal strength rose and he kept using it. The demon energy it provided him was becoming thicker and the number of bombs that could be controlled, as well as their power, had been increased. Even the bombs he personally created had increased in variety. Of course, if controlling a miniature atomic bomb would use 10 units of demon energy, creating a bomb with the power of a hand grenade would use 10 to 20 units of demon energy. Creating bombs with particularly great amounts of power would take much, much more demon energy. Thus, it was more cost-effective to control bombs in comparison, especially when the team had Xuan who provided bombs in a steady stream.
This change was good after all, so Wangxia had hoped to have more time to train this ability. He had thus been the first to enter a movie world amongst the team, even earlier than Zheng. He had also requested many plasma bombs from Xuan before entering, taking away practically all the plasma bombs Xuan had stored. Since they already had miniature nukes in reserve, these plasma bombs that had high power but a not too large area of effect were no longer too useful. It was better used for training. Apart from this, he had exchanged over ten thousand ordinary bombs and filled up several dimensional bags before entering the movie world.
The movie he had chosen to enter was Starship Troopers, an incredibly terrifying movie. A sea of bugs filled the mountains there. Even if the current team China went to the bug’s planet, they may not have been able to retreat easily.
“This is your antidote. Although I’m not sure if there are venomous types of bugs, and if this antidote can suppress those venoms. I used a modified T-virus to test it out, and this antidote can resolve viruses at the genetic level. A large majority of viruses should be killable. Take it.” Xuan handed over a dimensional bag to Wangxia.
A number of team members were around, gathered at God’s platform to wait for Wangxia to enter the movie world.
Wangxia didn't hesitate, receiving the bag and asked, “Thanks. If this antidote can remove viruses on the genetic level, it shouldn't cause any problems for the human body, right?”
“Err… if the second stage is unlocked, I think nothing should happen.” Xuan said indifferently.
“If so, why did you look away?”
No matter what, Wangxia was still going to enter Starship Troopers. Before he exchanged the entry, he suddenly turned to Xuan. “Xuan, I’ve always wanted to ask you about what you said that time. You said our country’s government isn’t suited for the whole world, or America’s current position, right?”
Xuan nodded definitively. “Yes, correct. Absolute power equals absolute corruption, no matter which person or government grasps this power. As long as there’s only ‘one’ in this position, it would result in corruption, when only one body of governance makes the laws, as well as oversees and enforces it. What do you feel?”
Wangxia lowered his head quietly. He suddenly lifted and said solemnly, “What I love is my country. No matter what, I’ll go on loving it. It has nothing to do with political party or worshipping anyone, or all the problems of the army. I just want to tell you, I’ll love my country forever!”
“Oh. Ok. My father was like that too.” Xuan didn’t have any other response, speaking as indifferently as always.
“...I’m going.”
Wangxia then exchanged the amount of entry time to Starship Troopers. He didn’t leave much points after. He had no abilities that needed to be exchanged, so he exchanged a lot of time for Starship Troopers, practically exhausting all his points.
In an instant, before anyone could recover from surprise, Wangxia appeared before them again, dressed in a major’s uniform from Starship Troopers that was tattered all over.
Wangxia looked incredibly tragic, his body full of fresh blood and wounds. The soot from explosions also blackened his face. However, his spirits seemed high, completely not being dispirited in the least by his injuries.
“Good, good. It’s been a long time, everyone. Everyone’s been well lately, I trust?” Wangxia laughed.
“How convenient.” Everyone nearby had this thought. Some found it absurd, and some didn’t know how to describe it. However, this method of going to movie worlds to train looked not bad.
“How do you feel?” Zero asked Wangxia curiously.
“Feel?” Wangxia paused for a moment, before laughing. “That’s not much to feel. Over there, I battled non-stop after entering the army. Everyday, I struggled for survival. Sometimes, I would relaxedly recuperate in the mothership. There were also pretty girls who would strike up a conversation with me. I quickly rose to the major rank since my military merits were notable. It doesn’t look good for the human army over there. They’re being bullied by the bugs and are losing planet after planet. As for the Bomb Dominator… take a guess, what do you think my latest self-created ability is?”
Every around shook their heads. However, upon seeing how large Wangxia’s improvement was, several people played with the idea of going to a movie world to train.
“Honestly, calling it self-created isn’t correct. This ability still needs large amounts of bombs for me to control first. I grasped nuclear fusion.” Wangxia said slightly mysteriously. He took out a small container after speaking.
“This is an isotope of hydrogen. If I control several miniature atomic bombs to explode at the same point, the resultant heat is enough to reach the requirement of nuclear fusion. It’s stronger than a normal miniature atomic bomb by over ten times [1], practically reaching the level of a tactical nuclear missile. This is a ability I obtained after much testing.” Wangxia chuckled to the rest.
If so, this meant Wangxia’s strength had rose a lot. And, he had supposedly unlocked the third stage as well. In certain cases, life and death battles were indeed better than anywhere else to train people, whether in strength or others...
“Speaking of which, a large reason of why I could unlock to the third stage was thanks to Xuan’s antidote. Using it gave me unbearable pain. I just wanted to die, and didn’t in the end. My genetic constraint thus rose a lot… Xuan, don’t go off…”
***
Regardless, Wangxia’s success seemed to foreshadow something. The second to enter the movie worlds was someone no one expected, Heng.
Heng had been behind closed doors ever since returning from God’s Realm. It was only during the second day after Wangxia returned did he leave his room and go to God’s platform. He then did something strange. He abandoned his silver bow, instead exchanging for the Sirius bow he had first used when he entered the movie worlds. This was an ancient bow that couldn’t compare to the silver bow. Of course, this referred to the ability to use scattered shots. If this wasn’t taken into account, the two bows weren’t much different if Heng’s Explosive Shot was used to evaluate.
When his exchange was complete, he went over to knock on Yanwei’s door. In truth, Yanwei had been secretly paying attention to Heng from the start. Although she thought she had been very careful, this small action had been noticed by all of team China. She just wasn’t aware of it. When Heng had opened his door to exchange the Sirius bow, she had already seen everything from the gap in her door. She had completely closed the door when Heng walked over to her room. She ignored Heng’s knocks, only powerlessly leaning her back against the door as she sat down in a daze.
Heng knocked for a while, before finally going quiet. After a long while, he said, “I’m going to Starship Troopers too. I’m not Wangxia, and I’m not familiar with the army nor do I have leadership skills. I don’t know how to become a major, close combat or have the large area of effect damage that Wangxia has. I only want to become strong, so I need to go and train myself.”
“I’m possibly going to die there, never to return. I originally wanted to see you one last time. Wei, I’m not going to talk about the next life. This life, I may be unable to repay you. But, I hope you won’t use my mistake to hurt yourself. If I die, live on properly.”
Heng exhaled, turning towards God. Just as he crossed a few metres, the door behind abruptly opened. Yanwei was standing there laughing coldly. She was holding a glossy dark green bow in her hand. It wasn’t known when she had exchanged this bow. However, the bow looked very harmonious in her hands, without the slightest feeling of incongruity.
“You want to escape your punishment through death? I won’t let you die so easily. Even if you have to die, I have to watch you do so. I’ll go with you to Starship Troopers and watch you torn to pieces by bugs!” Yanwei said coldly to Heng.
“Alright. If you’re at my side when I die, I won’t be afraid even if I go to hell.” Heng froze, before smiling to Yanwei as he said. Without turning back, he walked to the centre of God’s platform.
Yanwei hesitated, before laughing coldly as she followed behind him.
As usual, Xuan gave Heng and Yanwei each a bag of antidotes. According to him, this was the ‘improved’ antidote, with a medical efficacy definitely several times better than before...
“You think I’ll believe you?” These were Heng’s words. Still, he placed the antidotes in his hand, and extended a hand towards Yanwei.
Yanwei had a huge reaction, freezing up before shouting, “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Holding your hand. The time to enter the movie world is just an instant to God’s dimension. If we don’t go in together, we’ll likely miss each other and go in individually. So, I’m holding your hand.” Heng looked straight at her, and she hesitated a long while before passing her hand to Heng. Their souls seemed to tremble in the instant their hands held. Then, they entered Starship Troopers.
[1] Time to explain the difference. Atomic bombs rely on nuclear fission, the splitting the nuclei of a heavy element, such as plutonium. Nuclear fusion, which he now achieved, is different. Nuclear bombs that rely on nuclear fusion are called hydrogen bombs, or thermonuclear bombs. The yield of a thermonuclear bomb can be hundreds to thousands of times more powerful than the atomic bomb.