The man let out a merry laugh as he waved his hand towards Men Shi. Men Shi seemed as though he had lived this scenario out too many times to count and conjured another wine cup as the Emperor nonchalantly walked to the table at sat down. He drank the cup empty with one mouthful and then let out a deep but satisfied breath.
He then turned towards Jack and said, “Confused? The high and mighty Heavenly Emperor, the epitome of gracefulness and elegance drinking wine like a brute.” He smirked and Jack only then realized that he was staring at the man with wide eyes and an open mouth. Jack scratched his head sheepishly. For some reason, he only felt the gap between them only when he first saw him but at the moment, he felt as though the person was another person of equal standing to him.
When he realized this, he felt very weird. By nature, the person sitting there was the Heavenly Emperor, the most influential person in the entire Plane. He should feel oppressed when meeting him but he didn’t feel anything. The man smirked and said, “I may be the Heavenly Emperor out there but here, I am equal to you and him.” As he said that, the looked towards Men Shi.
Men Shi also let out a laugh and a smirk but it quickly faded as he looked at his cup and said seriously, “If what Jack said is true and they have some sort of agreement between them and Outsiders, then we may have some serious problems.” The Emperor nodded his head grimly as well but Jack nonchalantly asked, “How much power does a Heavenly Emperor have?”
The two were startled for a second as they looked at each other in confusion to the question. After a brief moment, Men Shi explained, “The Heavenly Emperor literally rules the Heavens. He decides the Tribulations, he can see the fate of someone from our Plane and he can banish anyone from the Plane. If he decides to banish someone, then the person can no longer gain any aid from our Energy, karmic luck or anything.” The Emperor smirked at the explanation but Jack looked more and more dumbfounded.
However, the reason he felt dumbfounded was something else, “If he can do all that, why the heck do you guys even let those Clans and Schools run rampant like that?” The two were taken aback again as Jack explained, “If you can do all that, then gradually raise the difficulty of the Tribulations for anyone who has ties to the Clan or Sect.” Men Shi then tried to explain, “If we did that, then it would be scorned for using underhanded methods-” Jack cut him off by saying, “Those guys are colluding with Outsiders to gift away our Plane, if we start talking about underhanded methods, then I would say they started first.” The two could not say anything to refute what Jack said. No matter how you looked at it, by refusing to help defend against the Outsiders, the only logical explanation was that they are colluding with them. So, they are basically enemies to them, why let them flourish in peace? The two fell into deep thought and then the Emperor asked seriously, “How do we explain it to all of them? Unless we have definite proof, it would seem as though we are abusing our authority and power.”
Jack looked at them in astonishment as he said, “You are the Heavenly Emperor for fucks sake. Since when do you have to explain yourself to anyone?” The two were startled as Jack said seriously, “It is the duty of everyone living in the Plane to protect it from Outsiders. Not helping and requesting rewards for doing such a duty is the same as colluding with the Outsiders. If they have no moral pride to protect their Home Plane, why in the seven Hell’s should they have the option to live in it?” The two were taken aback by Jack reasoning but for better or worse, they couldn’t find a flaw in it.
By not helping, the more people from the Celestial Palace and the Nether Prison die, meaning that their forces would only dwindle. Since there was more than one Plane out there eyeing this one, they fell into more and more disadvantage with every person they lost. Jack then asked them in a mysterious tone, “So, why should we be the only ones to suffer. If those guys don’t help protect this Plane, why should we let them live out peacefully and nonchalantly?”
He then took a sip of wine and said thoughtfully, “Since they find it beneath themselves to help protect this Plane and even want to offer us up on a silver platter, they can go find a new Plane to live in.” The two old monsters gulped as they heard Jack’s words. It was obvious that he didn’t hold the prestigious people from those Schools or Clans or Sects in any regard at all. Since they tried to take advantage of the Nether Prison and Celestial Palace while they were down, they were nothing more than garbage in Jacks eyes.
Jack then rose up from his seat and walked towards the Core of the Plane. He stared at it in silence for a while before saying, “The lifeline of the Plane is in as shitty of a situation as this, every resource counts at this point. Why give our enemies free resources? If they want to enjoy the Energy here and the other resources found in nature, then they should at least work for them by helping us defend this Plane.” He then turned around, towards the two, and Men Shi was startled by the coldness in Jack’s eyes.
Men Shi was stunned for a second before letting out a dejected laugh, “You truly are ruthless. However, you are right in this regard. If they want to enjoy the benefit our Plane gives, then they should help us defend it.” The Heavenly Emperor also sighed as he nodded his head. The two weren’t against Jack’s reasoning or stance on the matter but they found it hard to take this step without disrupting the power balance that had formed among the various powers.
The Emperor sighed as he massaged his temples, “I need to think of a way to word this without seeing overbearing….” Jack immediately rebuked, “So what if you seem overbearing? You control all life in this Plane so asking these idiots to do something in response of greedily gobbling up the natural resources and the Energy of the Plane is within all reasoning. I am more amazed, that you haven’t done so already to be honest….”
The Emperor let out a weak laugh as he stood up, took a big gulp of wine and said seriously, “You are right, it is about time I made my word pay here. We all live in the Plane and it is all of our duty to protect it. If they don’t like that, they can go and find a new Plane to live in.” With that, it seemed like a weight had been lifted from his shoulders as he resolutely walked out the door and disappeared. Men Shi, who had been silent all this time, then clapped and smiled at Jack, “Thank you. He finally found the determination to put his foot down.”
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Jack looked at Men Shi in puzzlement as he asked, “What do you mean?” Men Shi then said, “The seat of the Heavenly Emperor changes the same way the Wardens does. Each Quadrillion years, the Emperor passes on the throne to his or her most successful child, who will become the new Heavenly Emperor or Empress.” Men Shi then said, “As there are different personalities of the Wardens, there are different personalities of Emperors as well. I don’t mean this in a bad way but he has always been far too lenient and thinks too much of the consequences and the pride and honour of the Imperial Family.” As he said that, he softly shook his head but a smile was still evident on his lips. Jack gave a weak smile as he understood what Men Shi meant.
Since he was so concerned of the Imperial Families image in the eyes of others, he had been far too lenient. Jack didn’t want to dwell on the topic for much longer, so he looked towards he Core again and asked, “If the core repairs itself, what will happen to the formation up above?” Men Shi fell into thought as well. He hadn’t thought about it actually because the time needed for the Core to repair itself is so long that he may die several hundred times over in the mean time.
He crossed his hand s on his chest as he said, “I guess then the Warden needs to find a way to link it to the Core to help raise the density and purity of the Energy of the Plane.” Jack nodded his head as he felt that this was most probably the only use left for that formation then. Jack then fell into thought and mumbled, “These two are both batteries, the seven towers are generators…. Hmm...” As he mumbled to himself Men Shi’s eyes narrowed as he waited for Jack to talk first, so that he wouldn’t snap him out of his thoughts and maybe lose the way to link up the two Cores to aid the repair of the Original.
As Jack thought about it, he suddenly said, “I get it.” Men Shi immediately asked, “What did you figure out?” Jack turned to him and said, “The reason that the previous Wardens failed to link up the two Core was because the power sources were weak.” Men Shi’s brows furrowed as he looked at Jack in confusion.
Jack then explained his theory, “It wasn’t that the formation to link them up was wrong but rather, the upstairs Core didn’t have enough Energy to spare to help repair the Core and maintain the Energy density in the Plane at the same time. So, all we need to do is put a stopper in the middle.”
Men Shi still didn’t understand what he meant by this so Jack explained further, “Basically, what I mean is you have two devices that both consume an enormous amount of Energy, these are the Cores. However, the Generator, aka the formation which draws the Energy from the Prisoners and directs it to the Cores is far too weak to simultaneously sustain both of the Cores.” When Jack explained it like that, Men Shi figured something out as he asked cautiously, “So the reason that their attempt failed was because the Prisoners couldn’t provide enough Energy to fuel both of the Cores?”
Jack looked at the man and nodded, “Yes, I believe so. I am no expert on formations but to power a Formation that encompasses the entire Energy of the Plane… You would need an enormous amounts of Energy for it to work. So, currently I think that the upstairs Formation isn’t even working on full power because you can’t produce the amount of Energy it needs to reach peak performance.” As he stated so matter-of-factly, Jack rejoined Men Shi at the table. Men Shi had fallen deep into thought about what Jack had just said.
If it truly was as Jack had said, then if they could capture more of the Outsiders than kill, then they could fill up the Prisons more and more and as a result, they could power the formation to it’s peak. If they can exceed the peak, then they can link the Cores and use the excess Energy to help speed up the recovery of the Original Core. When his thoughts reached to here, he suddenly looked up and at Jack as though he was a monster. He then asked, “How did you reach this conclusion?” He couldn’t understand how Jack had reached this conclusion at all. Jack had no basic knowledge of Formations or anything but this theory on why the previous link up attempts of the Cores didn’t work, was the most likely the case.
The formations themselves weren’t the problem but rather, the Prisons didn’t just generate enough Energy to be able to stand the consumption of both Cores. Also following this train of thought, there were at least two different possible solutions for the problem right now, one easy one and another which was way harder. Men Shi waited for Jack’s answer intently and Jack answered, “Doesn’t this remind you of a giant machine?”
Men Shi was startled as his memories of his home and technology were muddled over time. Jack then continued, “All these Formations and Treasures and stuff seem like a differently built machine to me. These lines on the ground are wires, the Prison is a battery, the Core is a Computer. Like with technology itself, if you lack the sufficient Energy to power it, it wont work.”
Men Shi fell into thought as he had never looked at the formations and treasures as “pieces of technology” before. But as he remembered the things he learned way before he was brought here as a Warden, the more they did indeed seem to resemble each other. They were built with different materials and with a different design but the basic principles and goals of the things were the same. They just used different types of power and due to that, they were built around the type of power that was used.
With modern technology, electricity was the main form of such power, so everything either carried batteries or could be plugged into a battery. However, the treasures cultivators used, needed Qi. Just like with technology that didn’t work unless they had batteries to power it, these treasures were also useless unless someone injected Qi into them to make it work. The principle and basic goal was the same, the power source was different.
Men Shi thought about it for a moment and then looked at Jack as though he was a monster. This kind of a simple comparison was easy to understand but kind of hard to make. When you dissected the problem and compared it like that, then yes, it was an easy comparison to make but to Jack, who had no basic foundation in Formation or Treasures, to make this kind of a comparison was not something he was supposed to be able to do.
Men Shi sized up Jack again and re evaluated him a bit in his mind. “I hope he decides to take up studying Formations as a hobby in the future...” As Men Shi thought that to himself, he couldn’t help but sigh. As a Warden, they all had to follow a combat path and could dabble in things like Formations as merely a hobby.
If their combat power suffered because of it, then there might not be a Plane left to defend after all