Chapter 1216: Beloved Subject Sun, You Have To Help This Emperor To Do One Too!
Translator: Lordbluefire
“Get into formation and defend!”
Xia Taikang decisively gave the order.
The soldiers immediately gathered. They stared up at the Tang soldiers in the sky and formed a defensive formation while relying on their great swords and armors.
The Five Empires War Discussion, to speak about it bluntly, still had to have some spectacles for the audience to watch. If one sent ordinary troops to fight, things wouldn’t be cool enough. But if the soldiers had too high of a cultivation base, individual strength would be able to decide the victory as well. Hence, after some discussion by the five empires, they decreed that the cultivation bases of the soldiers couldn’t exceed the fifth level of the Body Refinement Realm.
Xia Taikang didn’t understand the Skyward Spirit Rune, but he felt that a spirit rune that could grant flight was simply magical and it would surely consume plenty of spirit qi. At that time, when these people were spent, he would be able to slaughter them with ease, like killing chickens and dogs.
One couldn’t help but say that Xia Taikang’s wealth of experience allowed him to make the correct judgment.
If Li Ziqi armed her soldiers with ordinary bows, she would truly not be able to break the Xia soldiers’ defense. However, she was the brilliant disciple of a great ancestor-level spirit runist.
“Xia Taikang, just concede. I don’t wish to kill!”
Li Ziqi persuaded.
“Even if the people of Xia have to die, they have to die on the battlefield!”
After Xia Kangcheng finished shouting, the Xia soldiers let out battle roars, wanting to intimidate their enemies.
“Alright then!”
Li Ziqi knew she would never be able to convince him with just words. “First team and second team, prepare the lightning rods. The other teams, stand guard!”
The soldiers of the first two teams took out a rod-shaped object from their backpacks. It was about a foot long with arm-sized thickness.
“Prepare!”
Li Ziqi commanded.
Xia Taikang felt uneasy. Scattering at this moment? Would there be a trap? Would the enemy use this chance to break their defense?”
Just when Xia Taikang was hesitating, Li Ziqi had given the order to attack.
“Activate, throw!”
Upon hearing the command, the soldiers used force to break the spirit rune wooden rods in their hands and tossed them toward the formation of the Xia soldiers.
“Knock them away!”
Xia Taikang roared.
Some Xia soldiers waved their swords, but when their swords slashed into the spirit rune rods, the rods immediately shone with dazzling lightning and exploded.
Rumble! Rumble!
Blue lightning akin to snakes lunging out from bushes wreaked havoc through Xia Taikang’s soldiers.
Everywhere the lightning pa.s.sed by, the Xia soldiers there would be charred black by it. Some even slumped over and fell to the ground while screaming miserably.
The armors of all empires were made of metal, and they were simply the best conductors. Even if it was against the first unit, as long as one tossed ten spirit rune rods over, the destructive might would be overwhelmingly great.
Other than those who died directly from the shocks, those that came in contact with it but survived felt their bodies turning numb. They couldn’t even stand straight.
Hua~
In the audience stand, the guests were all dumbfounded as they stood up from shock.
Why did it only take one round of attack, no, not even one round…in fact, only ten rods were tossed over and the Great Xia Army, who might be on par with the Great Wei Army, already collapsed?
At this moment, as long as the Xia soldiers descended. A ma.s.sacre would begin.
However, Li Ziqi wouldn’t bring herself to do such a crude thing personally. She waved her hand and her second-team advanced. Wooden rods could be seen being held in their hands.
Si~
Many people involuntarily drew in a breath of cold air. If the Tang Army did that again, the Xia Army would be annihilated.
“You are cheating!”
Xia Taikang howled in rage. He waved his sword and slashed toward the air.
A wave of sword qi surged to the sky, shooting straight for Li Ziqi. But before the sword qi could strike her, Xuanyuan Po unleashed a spear attack, while Helian Beifang unleashed a blade attack.
Bang!
Their weapons were knocked away. The sword qi continued on its way toward the little sunny egg.
But at this moment, a giant turtle sh.e.l.l suddenly sprang in front of the little sunny egg and blocked the wave of sword qi.
“Mn?”
Upon seeing this scene, Sun Mo frowned.
“Eldest Martial Sister, you have to be careful. This fellow seems to be wielding a saint weapon!”
Helian Beifang reminded her.
Such a weapon would greatly enhance the destructive might of any techniques.
“Xia Taikang, please pay attention to your words. What do you mean by cheating?”
Li Ziqi was very angry.
“You are shameless!”
Ying Baiwu couldn’t bear to watch any longer and directly roared. “If it wasn’t for my eldest martial sister being kind, all of your soldiers would have died!”
“Eldest Martial Sister, don’t waste words with him. Finish his men off first!”
Qin Yaoguang urged her on.
The countenances of the remaining Xia soldiers grew somewhat unsightly. They weren’t afraid of fighting to the death, but dying for nothing like this truly made them feel helpless.
Luckily, although the Qi Emperor was not very focused, he could tell this matter was very serious. So, he hurriedly stopped them.
“Ziqi, Taikang, stop fighting. Come over to speak if you guys have things to say!”
If these two truly went all out and fought until one died, there would be huge trouble. After all, one was a crown prince that was beloved by his entire country and a genius that was rarely seen in 1,000 years, tasked with the mission of leading the Xia Empire to the peak. And Li Ziqi was the princess most doted upon by the Tang Emperor and also Sun Mo’s favorite student.
Very soon, the two of them arrived before the throne and stood in opposition to each other!
“The Five Empires War Discussion is a test of our soldiers’ quality and our commanding skills. If you guys fly in the air, how can we still fight?”
Xia Taikang reproached.
“You guys can fly too!”
Qin Yaoguang sneered.
The students all followed behind Sun Mo to support their eldest martial sister.
“Crown Prince Xia, the era has changed.”
Tantai Yutang chortled, “After my teacher created the Skyward Spirit Rune, the style of wars has to follow. It doesn’t matter whether you recognize this as legitimate or not, a change is coming.”
Those who could stand here were all high officials. Upon hearing this, they immediately started discussing in low voices.
“I admit that Teacher Sun’s spirit rune is very impressive. However, he can’t possibly tattoo this rune for soldiers every day, right?”
Xia Taikang coldly snorted. “This is an exception so this doesn’t count. In a war, it still depends on whose soldiers are stronger and which army trained the hardest!”
“Since you are a commander and are skilled in battle formations, you should know the term ‘directly attack Huanglong’, right? On the battlefield, cutting the enemy’s flag and killing their commander might be something difficult to do. But everyone knows that this is one of the ways where defeat can be reversed into victory.”
Li Ziqi stared at Xia Taikang like how she would look at an old and inflexible antique. “Since my soldiers can fly, we can fly straight to your commander camp and execute a beheading strategy!”
Some high-ranking military officers immediately turned pale when they heard this.
“Wait a minute, doesn’t that mean that This Emperor isn’t safe as well?”
The Qi Emperor was afraid of death. He suddenly thought of the scene where there was a bunch of Tang soldiers flying above his palace and tossing the wooden rods down. Wouldn’t he die from shock then?
“Your Majesty, we from the Great Tang wouldn’t do something like that!”
Li Ziqi quickly consoled him.
“Hehe!”
The Qi Emperor laughed dryly before looking at Sun Mo. “Beloved Subject Sun, if you are to help This Emperor form a regiment of flying soldiers, how much money would that cost? Feel free to speak!”
Earlier, everyone had still felt that the Qi Emperor was foolish for wanting to give a city to Sun Mo. But from the looks of things now, the Qi Emperor was brilliant!
At the very least, he had built a friends.h.i.+p with Sun Mo.
“Xia Taikang, this spirit rune isn’t difficult to draw at all. As long as my teacher is willing to teach, a spirit runist with three years of experience and more will be able to replicate it.”
Li Ziqi divulged another important secret.
The atmosphere directly froze.
What did this mean?
It meant that the soldiers of Great Tang would all be capable of flight.
What?
Worried that this spirit rune would leak out?
The Tang Emperor could kill all the spirit runists after they tattooed the runes on the soldiers.
To emperors, they had a mult.i.tude of methods to keep a secret.
“Alright, I’ll accept the flying part. But what’s going on with the wooden rods?”
Xia Taikang changed the topic.
“That’s the lightning rod my eldest martial sister invented!”
Qin Yaoguang laughed. “If you are unconvinced, why don’t you invent one too?”
“…”
Xia Taikang felt extremely suppressed. This feeling was very unbearable. It was like someone had kicked his chest.
(If I could invent something like this, would I still be here talking nonsense with you? I would have long since used it!)
“The martial battle is a war simulation. A spirit rune rod like this cannot be ma.s.s-produced, right?”
Wei Wu`an interjected.
“This is a military secret of our Great Tang. It’s inconvenient to reveal it.”
Li Ziqi reb.u.t.ted.
“Since you put it like this, it’s meaningless to argue.”
Xia Taikang coldly laughed. “In that case, we can use all sorts of alchemy pills and forbidden techniques too. Don’t a.s.sume you are the only one with trump cards!”
“Sure!” Li Ziqi countered, “In any case, these spirit rune rods have no side effects, but your alchemy pills and forbidden techniques have.”
Xia Taikang’s countenance turned black.
“Alright, everyone, let’s stop arguing. Let’s resolve this calmly.”
The Qi Emperor persuaded. “Yuzhen, what do you think?”
“If we don’t restrict Great Tang’s flying spirit runes and spirit rune rods, there’s no need for army unit warfare anymore. Great Tang is definitely the victor!”
Jiang Yuzhen spoke directly. After that, she glanced at Sun Mo.
This man caused her training of several years in terms of war strategy and commanding soldiers to become useless. “In the future, victory for wars in the Nine Provinces will be determined by these two spirit runes!”
“So terrifying?”
The Qi Emperor was shocked now.
“That would have to depend on Ziqi’s producing speed for this type of spirit runes.”
Jiang Yuzhen bluntly explained.
“Alright then, let’s talk about future things in the future. Ziqi, the Five Empires War Discussion is a performance compet.i.tion, shouldn’t you give others a chance to perform? Why don’t you stop using that wooden rod?”
The Qi Emperor persuaded nicely. He felt that Li Ziqi would surely not agree, but she actually agreed to this straightforwardly.
“Sure!”
Li Ziqi didn’t mind. In any case, she had many trump cards.
For this round, the final verdict was that Great Tang was the victor.
Next, after 30 minutes of break, it was the second round of battle – Great Chu against Great Qi.
This battle was very fascinating. Jiang Yuzhen displayed her command and control to their absolute limits and used her sharp observation and astute on-the-spot reactions to finish off the valiant generals of Great Chu. The remaining soldiers of Chu then became like a pile of loose sand.
Everyone sent their congratulations.
However, Jiang Yuzhen had a desolate expression.
“Yuzhen, why are you not in a good mood?”
The queen felt pain in her heart.
“Queen Mother, the era has changed.”
Jiang Yuzhen was determined. She definitely had to have a kid with Sun Mo. Even if their son wasn’t intelligent enough, as long as he could obtain some of Sun Mo’s inheritance, the Qi Empire would still continue and prosper.
The first round concluded. Because Great Wei had one victory and one draw, both of their army units remained. If it wasn’t for Li Ziqi being an unknown variable, one could say that it was almost definite that Great Wei would obtain the first place.
The battle continued and on the fourth day, Wei Wu`an faced Li Ziqi.
When the Tang soldiers floated in the air, the Wei troops immediately got into a defensive formation and raised their ox leather s.h.i.+elds up. They looked like a bunch of lotus leaves joined together, forming a s.h.i.+eld with an extremely large surface area.
“Your Highness Ziqi, your lightning rods can only bully the Xia soldiers. For our Wei soldiers, we are both invincible in offense and defense!”
Wei Wu`an bragged. “So, I’ll permit you to use them.”
Indeed, although the destructive might of the lightning rods weren’t weak, ox leather s.h.i.+elds wouldn’t conduct electricity.
“Wei Wu`an, you have not even seen half a percent of the secrets of spirit runes!”
Li Ziqi’s lips curled. “First team, prepare the spiritwave cannons!”
As Li Ziqi gave the command, the soldiers of the first team took off their gloves and stretched out their right arms with palms facing outward.
“Begin the attack after gathering qi for three seconds!”
Light suddenly emerged from the palms of the soldiers, forming apple-sized qi spheres. After that, a whoos.h.i.+ng sound rang out as they blasted forth.
The spirit qi spheres weren’t large, but when they blasted into the ox leather s.h.i.+elds, a large hole directly appeared. After that, the qi spheres continued penetrating through and killing the soldiers hiding beneath the s.h.i.+elds.
The tough Wei Country’s armor couldn’t withstand such a spiritwave cannon.
Ten attacks struck their targets perfectly, and ten lives were lost.
Wei Wu`an’s countenance immediately turned green.
The others also fell completely silent. The main point was that none of them had seen such a weapon before.
“Is this another invention of Sun Mo?”
Everyone saw Xia Taikang suddenly stand up fiercely as his eyes were wide open.
Jiang Yuzhen closed her eyes.
“Wei Wu`an. Surrender or be annihilated!”
Li Ziqi snapped her finger. This time around, all her soldiers raised their right arms.
“I…”
Wei Wu`an didn’t want to concede defeat, but it was also impossible for him to watch his soldiers die for nothing. In the end, he could only lower his head helplessly. “I admit defeat!”
“Beloved Subject Sun, what is this?”
The Qi Emperor was shocked.
“A spiritwave cannon, a spirit rune that can release spirit qi directly as an attacking method!”
Sun Mo explained.
“In that case, can This Emperor do the woosh woosh too?”
The Qi Emperor gestured with his hands. He hated cultivating, so he liked this type of method where one could kill with the lift of a hand. It was cool and very relaxing.
“As long as you have spirit qi in your body, you can achieve that after activating the spirit rune!”
Sun Mo laughed. He saw many people itching to try it.
Honestly speaking, as long as one wasn’t a r.e.t.a.r.d, they would be able to sense the benefits of the spiritwave cannon. This thing was like having a handgun. One could shoot their opponents as long as they were unhappy. It was much faster than unleas.h.i.+ng a move with a sword.
“Beloved Subject Sun, you have to make one for This Emperor!”
The Qi Emperor stood up and tugged Sun Mo’s hands to exhibit amiability. “This Emperor heard that you have not married yet. Look at them. They are This Emperor’s daughters. If you like any of them, This Emperor will betroth them to you!”
“…”
These words were somewhat inappropriate, but this time around, the other officials didn’t try to persuade him. Even Grand Tutor Su pretended not to have heard it.
There were no solutions as they also wanted the two types of spirit runes. If they offended Sun Mo now, wouldn’t they have no chance to get them?
“Your Majesty, please do not make such careless jokes!”
Sun Mo rejected.
“Ah? Could it be that you are fond of males?”
The Qi Emperor lowered his voice. He would also occasionally play with a few refined-looking court eunuchs. Speaking of which, Sun Mo was truly good-looking.
“Royal Father!”
Jiang Yuzhen frowned.
“Haha, I was just joking!”
The Qi Emperor then glanced at the daughter he liked the most. “Yuzhen, what do you think of Beloved Subject Sun?”
“Your Majesty, how can you ask this question so recklessly?”
The queen hurriedly interjected. The importance of Sun Mo was extremely high. He was someone the Qi Empire couldn’t afford to offend. If Yuzhen said that she didn’t like him, what should they do?
Things would be awkward then.
But that shouldn’t be the case, right?
In any case, the queen herself was very fond of a man like Sun Mo. He was both handsome and talented.
(Aiya, I suddenly really want him to tattoo a spirit rune on me!)