Tang Wulin had visited this city with his friends in the past. After a brief period of rest, everyone set off on their journey again. Bear Lord didn"t reappear, and no one knew whether he had gone away to tend to his injuries or if he was truly fearful of them.
Prior to entering the sensory scope of the city"s military radars, everyone emerged from their black mechas and put on some normal clothing. They then rented a few SUVs, and only then did they continue on toward Bright City.
The legion had already taken care of all identification problems for them. The Blood G.o.d Legion had retirement quotas every year anyway, so it was a very simple matter for the legion to arrange some ident.i.ties for them. Furthermore, aside from Tang Wulin, no one even had to hide their ident.i.ties. At present, the name on Tang Wulin"s identification doc.u.ments was "Long Yue". [This is Long Yue (龙月), which directly translates to Dragon Moon, just like Tang Wulin"s suit of two-word battle armor, and it"s not to be confused with Long Yue (龙跃), the guy with the Mountain Dragon King martial soul.]
Tang Wulin was sitting in the pa.s.senger"s seat and looking out the window at the rapidly pa.s.sing scenery, but his mind was constantly operating at high speeds. After departing from the Blood G.o.d Legion, he had lost his most powerful backers. Even though an alternate ident.i.ty had been arranged for him, his powers were quite distinctive, and it most likely wouldn"t be difficult for people to discover his true ident.i.ty if they were to pay close attention to him.
Thankfully, the final ninth-grade soul missile that had been unleashed during the Shrek Academy bombing had provided a perfect smokescreen, convincing the vast majority of people that he was already dead. Furthermore, he hadn"t made too much of a name for himself on the continent yet, and the people from Shrek Academy who truly came under widespread scrutiny were still the members of the Sea G.o.d"s Pavilion.
It could even be said that he was more renowned on the Star Luo Continent than he was on the Douluo Continent.
If he wanted to revive Shrek Academy, it naturally wouldn"t be anywhere enough just to rely on the members of his Blood Dragon Squad. Even the Tang Sect was still being oppressed at this point in time, so the first thing that he had to do was to unite all of the powers that he could unite under his banner. In doing so, he would at least be able to ensure that his efforts to revive Shrek Academy wouldn"t be stomped out right away.
His heart immediately began to throb with pain at the thought of his past teachers and peers of Shrek Academy. These were all people whom he had studied with and grown alongside.
Shrek Academy had provided him with a warm haven that a.s.suaged the pain of losing his family, but now, even this new big family was gone.
His powers had been rapidly advancing during the past few years, and he was now finally a high-grade Soul Master, but he would gladly relinquish all of this power if it meant that he could be together with his family and friends. After all, his pursuit for power was all in a bid to better protect the people who were important to him, yet now, he was beginning to run out of people for him to protect.
He shook his head to shrug off these negative emotions, and his hands balled up into tight fists. Happiness was something that he had to fight for.
He closed his eyes to organize his own thoughts. Everything that he wanted to do, including reviving Shrek Academy and finding his parents, had to be done step by step.
The fatigue of traveling wasn"t an issue for high-grade Soul Masters like them, and two days later, they finally arrived at the federal capital, Bright City.
After entering Bright City, the first thing that they were struck by was the extremely modernized nature of everything there. All types of soul cars were driving along the streets, which were lined by countless skysc.r.a.pers that were extremely spectacular to behold.
Occasionally, a patrolling mecha could be seen flying through the sky, leaving a trail of dazzling light in its wake.
The law and order in Bright City was actually quite good, and the patrolling mechas acted more so as devices to get the younger generation interested in joining the army, rather than to actually enforce law and order.
Ever since the Eagle Faction had seized the upper hand in the re-elected federal parliament, the influence of the military in the federation had increased significantly. War seemed to be an imminent inevitability, and even though Tang Wulin had been at the Blood Legion base this entire time, he had been constantly learning information about the federation"s current situation during the days leading up to his departure.
At the moment, the federation was spreading a lot of negative press about the other two continents, to the extent that they were even digging up historical events that had taken place thousands of years in the past.
This was undoubtedly a blatant attempt to spread propaganda and create controversy in order to evoke enmity toward the two neighboring continents.
Was war truly inevitable?
Tang Wulin was absolutely against wars and conflict, but he had to admit that if a war really were to break out, it would perhaps create an opportunity for him.
The three continents were situated very far away from one another, and if the Douluo Federation wanted to attack the other two continents, then it would definitely have to send its troops on extremely far journeys. Even with the invention of soul planes, there was no way for these devices to win an entire war against two other continents. Furthermore, even if the Star Luo Empire and Dou Spirit Empire were inferior to the federation when it came to technological advancement, they weren"t too far behind, and if a war were to break out, it would not be one that could be decided in a short time.
A war would most definitely whittle down the Douluo Federation"s military power, and even the major powers would most likely get involved in order to reap more benefits in the future.
What was the root cause behind all wars? They were all conflicts of interest. The Douluo Federation was quickly running out of all types of resources, and if it weren"t for the abundance of resources on the Star Luo Continent and Dou Spirit Continent, the federation wouldn"t be taking such blatant steps to try and start a war.
Seeing as there were benefits to be reaped, the major families and major powers certainly weren"t going to just look on from the sidelines. In particular, a super organization like the Spirit PaG.o.da that had a presence on all three continents would stand to benefit the most from a world war.
In order to improve everyone"s overall combat prowess, the Spirit Ascension Plane would definitely receive more patronage, and the soul spirits would also only become more expensive, and that wasn"t even taking into account the huge number of Soul Masters that were under the Spirit PaG.o.da"s control.
Tang Wulin had recently heard a piece of news, which stated that the Spirit PaG.o.da seemed to have successfully developed 1,000-year-old and 10,000-year-old soul spirits. If this were true, then the Spirit PaG.o.da"s status on the continent would receive another enormous boost, especially if they could actually successfully synthesize 10,000-year-old soul spirits.
10,000-year-old soul spirits would be able to provide qualitative enhancements to Soul Masters and also decrease the overall requirements on one"s spiritual power. After all, a 10,000-year-old soul spirit could offer a Soul Master four soul skills at most, thereby allowing them to absorb fewer soul spirits.
Of course, these synthesized 10,000-year-old soul spirits were also supposed to be extremely expensive. Ever since they had been released, the Spirit PaG.o.da had already made extremely significant earnings from them, and they had even voluntarily lowered the prices of the newly synthesized 1,000-year-old soul spirits, thereby resulting in an even greater influx of revenue. It was no exaggeration at all to say that the Spirit PaG.o.da was as rich as the entire federation. It was always said that destruction always pursued those who became too great or too powerful for their own good, but as things currently were, that didn"t seem to be a problem for the Spirit PaG.o.da.
They had even become the main source of financial support behind the military"s Eagle Faction, and all of this information had been compiled by Tang Wulin during the past few days.
It was undoubtedly the case that the Spirit PaG.o.da benefitted the most from Shrek Academy"s destruction and the Tang Sect"s decline.
At present, the Spirit PaG.o.da had already well and truly cemented itself as the number one superpower on the entire continent. Of course, it had always been the most powerful organization on the continent, but in the past, Shrek Academy and the Tang Sect had been there to counteract its influence. However, these restrictions had already disappeared, and the Spirit PaG.o.da was naturally able to do anything it wanted without any qualms or inhibitions.
With that in mind, the Holy Spirit Cult naturally surfaced in Tang Wulin"s mind.
He had already had countless run-ins with evil Soul Masters, and the impression that they had given him was one of ferocity, cruelty, evil, and also mystery.
Regardless of whether it was him or the other powers on the continent, there was almost no one who knew just where these evil Soul Masters came from, nor where they were currently situated and in what form their organization existed. No one knew even the slightest details about them, which resulted in this current situation, where evil Soul Masters could strike any corner of the continent at any time.
They had even played a hand in the recently abyssal tide, and from that alone, it was clear to see that they were nothing short of completely demented!
If the abyssal plane were to invade this world, countless people would undoubtedly perish, yet the Holy Spirit Cult had still made the completely inhuman decision of siding with this abhorrent alternate plane.