Chapter Eighteen: There Are No Cowards in Hanlan!

“When have you ever not lied to me!”

Yan Qilu strode up to Ye Han, tossed the doll in her arms to the ground, planted her hands on her hips, and lifted her snowy chin high, sharp eyes locked with his. “This is clearly our assessment! Why aren’t we allowed to participate?”

In theory, the college entrance exam should have been led by Hanlan Star, but in reality, it had been reduced to a substitute. No, not even a substitute—they were denied even the right to know. If Yan Qilu hadn’t left a backdoor, Hanlan would have remained completely in the dark. Their right to information had been erased, and the fate of their planet was manipulated by others. Yan Qilu felt stifled, overwhelmed by fear and helplessness.

But she could not show the slightest hint of timidity before Ye Han. Because she was afraid. Afraid Hanlan would be reduced to nothing, not even worthy of being a pawn, utterly ignored.

“This…”

Ye Han’s heart skipped a beat as he looked at Yan Qilu, her face cold and eyes filled with doubt and indignation.

Yan Qilu spoke, each word deliberate and stubborn: “You are also the god of Hanlan.”

“When did Hanlan lose even the right to fight for you?”

“Are you questioning Hanlan’s loyalty to you?”

By the end, Yan Qilu nearly screamed, her voice raw and desperate. Her watery eyes brimmed with mist, and her clear, crisp tone was tinged with a hoarseness that should not have existed. Yan Qilu forced herself to hold back, refusing to let tears fall.

Ye Han gazed at the little girl before him, her whole body radiating defiance, and pondered briefly. “It’s not that Hanlan is facing disaster, I fear…”

“For the Yan clan! For Hanlan! For our god! As the seventh-generation clan leader and your earthly agent, I beseech you for permission to fight!”

Ye Han hadn’t finished speaking before Yan Qilu interrupted.

“If Hanlan’s fate must be handed over to others, what’s the difference between us and cowards?”

“Cowards die in disgrace! Hanlan has no cowards!”

“Hanlan will fight to the death without regret. Please, give Hanlan a chance.”

Yan Qilu, convinced the world was real, knew this might be the only chance for Hanlan to intervene. She had pulled aside the veil of divinity—the god’s authority would wane day by day. In the end, the god would either choose destruction to preserve his aloofness, or descend to lead his people toward glory. If they failed to intervene now, they would never have another chance.

Yet Ye Han did not realize the depth of Yan Qilu’s anxiety, nor the implications. Despite her repeated assurances, Ye Han, considering Hanlan Star’s dwindling population, refused. “Let’s forget it. Hanlan needs time to recover.”

“No, we don’t!” Yan Qilu could no longer suppress her grievances. Large tears rolled down her delicate cheeks, gathering at her chin and dripping to the floor.

“If Hanlan is no longer needed by you, does it even have a reason to exist?”

Yan Qilu muttered in despair, her head bowed, eyes filled with hopelessness. Even her virtual form began to dissipate, teetering on the verge of collapse—a sign the real brainwave could not be read by the processor, usually heralding a breakdown of the real spirit.

“All right, you all just rest and recover. Leave this to me.”

---

Seeing Yan Qilu’s poor state, Ye Han reached out to touch her forehead, but before he could make contact, she vanished from the virtual space.

“She logged off?”

Ye Han’s hand hovered awkwardly in midair. Well, this girl was angry. Ye Han smiled bitterly and shook his head, then left.

Gene Blood Pool, Control Room.

Yan Qilu closed the virtual space in despair, her once lively eyes now dull and lifeless.

“Our god has abandoned Hanlan. What did we do wrong?” Yan Qilu sat listlessly in the command chair.

Half an hour later, she suddenly sprang up with renewed determination. “No! Hanlan isn’t wrong—it’s our god who’s wrong this time!”

Revitalized, Yan Qilu looked toward the portal and murmured, “Hanlan will prove it.”

Time ticked by. As dusk fell and Earth’s players on Hanlan Star were forced offline to allow their clones’ bodies to recover from fatigue, a coded transmission was sent from the direction of the Gene Blood Pool.

---

Hanlan Star.

Southern Continent, Yue Prefecture.

Deep within the mountains, a cavern had long been hollowed out. A spherical chamber, over eight hundred square meters and brimming with technological sophistication, rested quietly. Around the sphere, countless projections flickered, with three or four people stationed before each, constantly monitoring Hanlan Star’s virtual world.

This was the main hub of Hanlan’s virtual space.

“Clan leader, the message from Yan Clan of Qingzhou has been verified—authentic!”

“Oh?”

Within the cavern, a graceful, alluring man exuded a captivating air, humming softly.

“What are you waiting for? Enter this information into the main brain!”

Su Nuan frowned slightly. Though a man, he inspired pity and admiration.

“A bunch of upstarts, daring to compete with Hanlan for favor?” With a delicate gesture, Su Nuan’s eyes gleamed with undisguised sarcasm.

He then lamented, “If only I had been born a woman, our god would have descended upon the Su clan instead of the Yan clan this time.”

“That Yan Qilu is useless, having forgotten even Hanlan’s core strengths!”

Su Nuan, frustrated, turned and instructed, “Our god thinks Hanlan isn’t as good as those upstarts. I’ll give you three hours—use the Yan Clan’s signal relay on Xiyuan Star to seize all information from that so-called Dongli Dynasty!”

“Clan leader, should we take direct control?” someone beside him asked.

“No need. Since our god has descended upon the Yan clan, they will be the legitimate line. The Su clan must not overstep.”

Su Nuan stretched lazily, adding, “Besides, this way those upstarts won’t notice anything amiss and complain to our god.”

“Understood!” The person beside him nodded reluctantly.

As he turned to relay the order, Su Nuan added with a sly tone, “According to our god, Hanlan is a technological civilization. Find a way to crack information firewalls of similar civilizations.”

“If those upstarts die at the hands of other civilizations, it won’t concern us!”

With that, Su Nuan closed his eyes, feigning sleep, radiating an aura of frailty as if he had never spoken.

The messenger’s eyes lit up as Su Nuan closed his eyes. Enlightened, he nodded and went to carry out the instructions.

The encrypted message sent by Yan Qilu was promptly pinned to the main brain’s homepage by the Su clan.

---

Even though most Hanlan Star’s bases were damaged, half an hour later, the message had spread globally. Guided by the information, many survivors who had hesitated to leave their base ruins now resolved to migrate, heading toward the relatively intact bases.

---

Inside the cave.

Ye Han shivered inexplicably. Was it the chill mountain air? He tightened his cloak.

Xiyuan Star’s highest combat power was ninth tier. The daytime nuclear bombardment was devastating for those below eighth tier, but had little effect on the strongest.

“Different sequences have different priorities. Nuclear bombardments seem dominant, but once the fairy and phantom types recover, they’ll likely suppress the others.”

Ye Han sat cross-legged in the stone chamber, staring at the map of the Dongli Dynasty, pondering how to break the current deadlock.

Fairy and phantom candidates summoned to Xiyuan Star were surely elite warriors of their respective planets, each comparable to a walking nuclear bomb. The technological side’s heavy weaponry lacked flexibility and was no match for them.

“Luan Shuangyu probably follows a mass production route. I wonder what tier her gene warriors have reached.”

Ye Han’s gaze swept to the Dongli Imperial capital. He had already tracked Luan Shuangyu’s location while setting up the relay during the day.

Within the pan-human camp, individual combat power was ranked from tier one to nine—the limit of the bonded planets’ power. To surpass this, one needed either the permission of the planet’s bondholder or to break the rules through sheer force.

However, bondholder permissions varied, so each planet’s ninth tier power was different. A first-tier planet’s ninth tier could only barely match a second-tier’s first tier.

For those planets capable of daytime nuclear bombardments, Ye Han estimated they were second-tier peak.

His own Dongfeng-86 achievement points were only fifty. Even if the candidates’ nukes were more advanced, they hadn’t reached controllable nuclear technology. Thus, their individual achievement points couldn’t exceed one hundred, likely between sixty and seventy.

A bonded planet could upload only three crystallized products, so their total achievement points would be around two hundred.

As for civilization cohesion, Ye Han had only seen Earth reach 0.7. No one else exceeded 0.5. In the Liyang Star Domain, his classmates hovered between 0.2 and 0.4.

“Across the entire Liyang Star Domain, fewer than three hundred people have reached third-tier permission this year!” Ye Han muttered.

These were household names in Liyang. Those specializing in quantum research and nuclear development numbered fewer than ten.

The global nuclear coverage seen during the day would have exhausted all their resources, yet it still might not achieve such devastation.

“If the damage is below eighth tier, that means Xiyuan Star’s bond level should be second-tier?”

Ye Han’s analysis brightened his eyes. Estimating from the nuclear blast’s lethality, if Xiyuan Star’s bond were third-tier, then the nukes wouldn’t affect third-tier eighth-tier warriors—at most third-tier first-tier.

Clearly, Xiyuan Star’s first-tier warriors hadn’t reached that strength, so Xiyuan must be a second-tier permission planet.