Chapter 673: The Seizure of the Golden Apple Mother Tree

The fiery red figure was the Flamewrath Giant, who had just advanced to seventh rank not long ago. In this moment of crisis, Song Chi had no choice but to send him out to give it a try.

Taking the storage capsule, the Flamewrath Giant didn’t hesitate. His body blurred into a streak of fire as he shot out of the warship’s hatch.

But before he fully cleared the ship’s hull, a black mark fired from behind, darting into his body. Other than Song Chi, his master, no one noticed.

Inside the ship’s control room, Song Chi’s gaze shifted and yet another battleship component was activated.

Celestial Authority Ring: Enslave Seal—Berserk!

Outside the warship, the relentless waves of self-destruction still raged. Under the cover of the Black Hole Domain, the Flamewrath Giant regained his peak form. At tens of thousands of kilometers tall, he looked every bit a descending fire god, his presence blazing even amid the torrent of energy.

But things were far from over. Suddenly, a streak of gold burst from the side-mounted Dreadnought and, already massive, the Giant began to swell again.

A hundred thousand kilometers.

Three hundred thousand kilometers.

A million kilometers.

……

In mere moments, the Flamewrath Giant’s height soared to a million kilometers. Even his aura surged to break into the eighth rank.

A brand-new eighth rank entity was impossible to miss in this chaotic battlefield. Even in the energy storm from a peak Eighth-Tier Dominator’s self-destruction, nearby sides couldn’t help but snap their eyes to him.

But the Flamewrath Giant paid them no mind. Under Song Chi’s explicit orders, he barreled straight for the nearby Eighth-Tier Golden Apple Mother Tree.

Of course, without letting it slow him down, he lashed out at a nearby Seventh-Tier Serpent Demon Dominator on the way.

After all, with so many heavy-hitters watching, he still had to put on a show.

[Defeated a Seventh-Tier Eight-Armed Serpent Demon. Battleship evolution success rate slightly increased!]

Already battered by the pseudo-mythic energy storm, the Seventh-Tier Eight-Armed Serpent Demon was no match. The Flamewrath Giant, now surging with Eighth-Tier power, crushed it with ease. As an enslaved being serving on the Heavenly Ruin, its kill naturally counted towards the ship’s total.

Hearing the alert in his mind, Song Chi split off a trace of focus to check the Warship Evolution Quest panel again.

By the time he closed it, he had his answer.

That Seventh-Tier Serpent Demon only pushed the Heavenly Ruin’s evolution success rate to 18.001%. In other words, a single Seventh-Tier boss only increased it by three percent.

Even prepared for this, Song Chi still frowned.

“Even though, during a Dreadnought’s promotion to Star-Annihilator, except for the first kill, grinding blood from other races is way less effective, but this is still a bit much.”

“And that’s just the second one. It’s only going to get tougher from here.”

Letting go of the thought, Song Chi shook his head and stopped dwelling on it.

On second thought, such strict limits actually made sense. If Dreadnoughts evolving to Star-Annihilators could really boost their success so easily, wouldn’t the factions with Star River-class ships just nurture Star-Annihilators left and right?

Just injure some Seventh-Tier aliens with a Star River-class ship, then have the evolving vessel finish them off. Wouldn’t the success rate skyrocket?

Once he figured this out, Song Chi’s main attention returned to the Flamewrath Giant, though he still kept a thread of focus ready to steer the Heavenly Ruin—now a micro neutron star—away at any moment.

The energy storm was about to die down. No matter the outcome, the area around the Golden Apple Mother Tree would soon become the most watched hotspot. It was definitely not a place to linger.

If the ownership of the Golden Apple Mother Tree had already been settled, he would never still be here.

Back with the Flamewrath Giant, his power now at eighth rank, he also moved much faster, reaching the Golden Apple Mother Tree in no time.

His crimson arms wrapped tight around the trunk while boiling flames sizzled and crackled against the Golden Apple Mother Tree.

Two utterly different kinds of dominator energy gnawed at each other, with the Giant’s wild and chaotic fire energy scorching the trunk.

At this point, neither the Giant nor Song Chi could spare a thought for the details. Power surged in the Giant’s body, every ounce channeled into the tree he held.

No wonder the Giants are famed for strength and physique across the Shattered Sea of Stars—even if this Giant was only a pseudo-eighth rank, forcefully elevated by Song Chi, he still showed overwhelming power.

The ground on the Floating-land split wide open, rocks and sand flying as the Golden Apple Mother Tree was slowly and brutally ripped from the earth, roots and all.

Such rough handling would have caused unimaginable harm to the tree’s roots, but luckily, the Giant had soaked them beforehand with Celestial Spirit Earth and Azure Spring Essence, blunting a lot of the damage.

While waiting, the Black Hole Domain’s time soon ran out. Thankfully, Song Chi, always on edge, activated the True Spirit Guard of the Angel King trait just in time.

But under the terrifying storm, even the Angel King’s Spirit Apparition faded quickly. When it disappeared, the newly acquired Abyssal Nine-Headed Hydra Spirit Apparition emerged to take its place.

He’d thrown everything he had at this, but still couldn’t hold out until the Flamewrath Giant brought back the Golden Apple Mother Tree.

With only a few seconds left on the micro neutron star form, Song Chi had no choice but to activate the Starlight Flash Spirit Stone Talisman and warp to a distant corner of space.

He knew all too well the power of this storm. Even though the Heavenly Ruin’s Last Aegis component had already fully repaired the ship, he wouldn’t risk lingering a moment longer.

Without the absurd defenses of the neutron star form, the Heavenly Ruin in ship mode would have no protection out here.

But in the instant before he vanished, Song Chi fired a subtle silver beam at the Golden Apple Mother Tree, now fully uprooted by the Giant.

Then the Heavenly Ruin vanished from its spot. When it reappeared, it was already a full light-year away.

On this core floating landmass over ten thousand light-years across, a light-year wasn’t much, but it was enough to get the Heavenly Ruin well clear of the battlefield.

This had always been Song Chi’s plan. The moment that peak Eighth-Tier Serpent Demon Dominator chose to self-destruct, he resolved to quit the field. It was never a spur-of-the-moment decision.

No matter what, the self-destruction of a peak Eighth-Tier demon would be enough to shatter the already strained shield around the Demon Serpent Floating-Land. With that, their operation’s ultimate objective was done.

So Song Chi made what he considered the most prudent decision.

No matter if his schemes succeeded or failed, the first thing was always to escape the battlefield.

Don’t forget, his plan had already written off the battleship replication as a loss. Everything that came after would be handled by the true Heavenly Ruin. Ensuring his own safety—this was always his number one rule.

……

Just as Song Chi expected, after the peak Eighth-Tier Serpent Demon Dominator exploded, it took out two already wounded Seventh-Tier demons along with the one that the Giant smashed. Finally, the shield around the Demon Serpent Floating-Land collapsed for good.

More and more cracks appeared. In the end, when the Xian Qin Ancestral Dragon joined up with multiple Star River-class ships to bombard it, the massive shield finally broke apart.

When the shield shattered, a thunderous voice rang out among the billions of warships outside the Floating-land.

The Divine Dynasty Emperor Ying Huang gave the order to attack, and a massive tide of Torch Kingdom warships surged into the Demon Serpent Continent.

At this point, the tides of war were clear. The Eight-Armed Serpent Demon side could no longer turn things around.

Maybe they’d seen this coming. Even that Eighth-Tier Dominator’s self-destruction inside the realm might have been a deliberate last-ditch attempt to take down some of the Divine Dynasty’s elite. Either way, the two Ninth-Tier serpent demons on the Floating-land wasted no time fleeing.

They didn’t have the resolve of their Eighth-Tier kin. The second the shield broke, they slipped away through a transport tunnel beneath the Serpent Demon Holy City.

When this was discovered, the Emperor Ying Huang aboard the Superdimensional Mothership didn’t celebrate—instead, he looked even more grim.

Status means different priorities—their problems are not the same.

When the lower-level captains below rejoiced at being spared a brutal fight, Ying Huang’s gaze had already turned to the depths of the Sea of Stars.

That was the western edge of the Demon Serpent Floating-Land, the final stronghold of the Eight-Armed Serpent Demon Civilization: the Demon God Floating-Land in the heart of their galaxy cluster.

“Looks like they have gathered most of their remaining forces on the Demon God Floating-Land. This last battle—the carnage will be unimaginable…”

……

Song Chi could already guess what was happening outside, but ninety-nine percent of his attention remained on the Flamewrath Giant.

The silver light Song Chi had fired before fleeing came from the Superbody Compression Plate component.

The beam hit the Golden Apple Mother Tree—its roots now fully pulled from the earth—and the tree instantly shrank thousands of times. It was still quite large, but now the Dimensional Spatial Stone on the Giant was enough to contain it.

Swoosh, swoosh, swoosh!

Several beams of energy streaked their way. With most of the energy shockwave dying down, Song Chi watched through the neural link etched on the Flamewrath Giant and spotted that these were Petrifying Rays in a blue-gray hue.

Clearly, they came from the Eight-Armed Serpent Demons overhead.

As for the surviving Torch Captains, though they coveted the Eighth-Tier Golden Apple Mother Tree, they weren’t about to attack an ally right in the middle of this civilizational war.

Buzz!

A spatial ripple passed, and the Eighth-Tier Golden Apple Mother Tree was quickly stowed in the Dimensional Spatial Stone. Song Chi acted instantly. As soon as he confirmed he had it, he activated the Tome of Divine Will on the Heavenly Ruin from a light-year away.

With the Supreme Black Component fully powered, the switching mark left on the Giant was triggered and the Giant was recalled from afar.

This was part of Song Chi’s plan all along. The black mark received before the Giant left the ship was set down by the Tome of Divine Will.

Song Chi was far too cautious to rely on only one setup.

If he could grab the Golden Apple Mother Tree before his time ran out, great. If not, the Tome of Divine Will was his backup.

With long-range recall, soon a space ripple shimmered in the ship. The Flamewrath Giant—itself shrunk back to miniature—instantly reappeared aboard.

He was still shrouded by dense berserk energy, the Enslave Seal’s effect not yet burned out.

With a thought, Song Chi deactivated Berserk. As that wild energy faded, the Giant’s aura crashed—dropping from eighth rank, then plunging below fifth and sixth—until finally he was left utterly drained.

Enslave Seal—Berserk burns away a creature’s life force. Even if cancelled, throwing everything into one burst can’t be undone. Without other aid, the Giant would soon die.

Losing a Seventh-Tier enslaved servant like this would be a huge waste.

Song Chi might once have been helpless, but now was different.

He reached into the storage capsule beside him and quickly fished out a porcelain bottle.

Inside were two gleaming pills, fragrant with medicinal aroma: freshly refined Genesis Creation Pills.

He’d gotten three Genesis Creation Pills total. One was already used for the Dominator Worm, so these were the last two.

He tossed one to the weakened Giant, signaling for him to swallow it immediately.

As soon as the Giant downed the Genesis Creation Pill, Song Chi watched his withered aura quickly begin to recover.

Second rank.

Fourth rank.

Sixth rank.

……

In under two minutes, the Flamewrath Giant was back to seventh rank.

Even after already witnessing this pill’s magic, Song Chi still couldn’t help but marvel.

If not for the fact that refining these required real golden fireseed artifacts, he’d brew up hundreds without hesitation.

Setting other thoughts aside, Song Chi continued steering the warship to speed away into the distance.

Earlier, he’d deliberately left a Fourth-Tier slave outside to scout, and now that one reported back: the Divine Dynasty forces had stormed the Demon Serpent Continent. With that confirmed, all Song Chi wanted was to hide away and be safe—he couldn’t care less about anything else.

As for the clan elders and the others, the warship replications had all been destroyed amid the mythic energy tempest and the Eighth-Tier’s final blast.