CHAPTER 853: CHAPTER 441: FINALLY TAKING ACTION AGAINST THE MECHANIC ASSOCIATION

After all, getting it for free wasn’t bad at all.

Once they confirmed it was a misunderstanding, the atmosphere between the two eased a lot. The Prophet even said, "Lord Azure Dragon, when the Holy Mother Church split from the Conservative faction, they took away many important items. If you happen to discover any, we are willing to pay a substantial price to redeem them."

"Important items?" Li Ming’s heart stirred slightly, "What important items?"

"I have some pictures here..." the Prophet said, sending over a few images.

Li Ming browsed through them briefly; they were all odd-looking items, like oval-shaped flesh-like proliferations, black busts...

He hadn’t seen any of them before, except...

Li Ming’s eyes fixed on one of the images, a black circular symbol stone, almost identical to the one in the Tank Guard’s hand.

He had an intuition that the Prophet’s roundabout approach was ultimately aimed at this stone.

"Hmm... what are these things used for?" Li Ming asked casually.

"Well..." The Prophet hesitated, "It’s confidential to the organization, hard to say. However, we are willing to pay a price that will satisfy you."

Then she added, tactfully, "Many of these items are quite hard to use without special methods, so they’d only be decorative to you."

"What you say makes sense." Li Ming nodded, then changed his tone, "However, I haven’t discovered any of the things you mentioned."

The Prophet was silent for a moment, her tone calm, "Is that so? Then perhaps the Swearer has hidden them elsewhere."

After exchanging a few perfunctory words, the two ended the conversation. The Prophet turned to look at the Holy Mother at her side, "It seems we’ve temporarily pacified him; he doesn’t seem inclined to go to war with us."

"But... the Oathkeeper Stone, he feigns ignorance."

"Our coordinates are top secret, even if he wants to find them, it’ll take some effort. A temporary truce is the best choice." The Holy Mother frowned, "As for the Oathkeeper Stone, unless he didn’t kill the Swearer, he would surely discover it."

Her eyes flickered, "However, even if he passes the test of the Kaleidoscope World, he cannot gain recognition; if mishandled, perhaps the Oathkeeper Stone will help us eliminate this enemy."

......

"This thing, what exactly is it?"

After ending the communication, Li Ming grew interested and went to stand before the Tank Guard in the corner.

In its metal palm was a black stone, and the black symbol had spread across its entire hand, yet it hadn’t caused any damage.

Li Ming’s heart stirred slightly, and he pressed his palm against the metal exterior of the Tank Guard, attempting possession once more.

This time, however, he felt a completely different sensation, as though the entire palm had a vague feeling that it was not his own.

With a gentle grip, the black symbol surged, and suddenly, the possessed Li Ming felt a tightening of his mind, and his vision scattered as if he had fallen into a kaleidoscope, with various colors passing before his eyes.

He had experienced similar scenes many times before and remained unperturbed. After an indeterminate amount of time, everything cleared up in front of him.

"This is..." Li Ming frowned, looking around, unsure of where he had arrived.

Before him stood lush, towering ancient trees and dense, low shrubs, even with black semi-transparent grass stems and wildflowers.

But they were all composed of a black semi-transparent crystal substance, the entire Crystal Jungle glistening with a translucent ink-black.

Even the ground beneath his feet was covered in something that felt like soil but had the texture of crystalline fine sand.

He was on high alert, checking his physical state, surprisingly still in the guise of the Tank Guard.

Then he sensed the control system right away. It was still intact, which reassured him somewhat.

Yet in such a beautiful environment, it was filled with an omnipresent hostility and sense of oppression.

Li Ming didn’t know where this oppressive feeling came from. After staying in place for a long time, he attempted to move forward, stepping down, and the world shifted instantly.

The black plants vanished, replaced by a vast chaotic sky, dim as dusk, with strange dark shadows layered over everything and black-purple mist floating in the air.

The oppression was stronger all around, yet it didn’t cause any harm to the Tank Guard.

"Step by step, a different world?" Li Ming frowned again, attempting to step forward once more, and the surroundings shifted once more, turning into a fragmented world with gray shards floating around, intertwined spiral staircases spiraling into unseen parts.

"What is this place?" Li Ming looked around, kept moving forward, encountering scenes of interstellar battlefields, drifting Gobi deserts, even deep-sea settings ranging kilometers down.

The pressure grew stronger, and after an unknown amount of time, the pressure around him became almost unbearable even for the Tank Guard.

A voice suddenly appeared in his mind, "A mechanical body cannot inherit..."

The voice came out of nowhere, and Li Ming had no idea what had happened.

But in the next moment, he was back inside the cabin, and simultaneously, the Tank Guard’s metal hand, wrapped in black symbols, returned to its original state.

It was as if nothing had happened, but the black circular stone began to emit slight fluctuations, barely noticeable.

"Inherit? Inherit what, the identity of a Swearer?" Li Ming could only speculate based on existing clues.

"A mechanical body can’t do it, it seems only life forms are eligible."

He looked at the black stone, deciding that he wasn’t going to take any risks himself.

Yet it seemed to have been stimulated somehow, constantly emitting energy fluctuations, quite peculiar, like a certain frequency.

Li Ming took out the only detection equipment he had on him and found nothing unusual, no signals.

"Strange..." He was slightly hesitant; the thing clearly had a secret, but what that secret was remained unknown.

For now, unable to figure it out, he decided to leave it be. On the way back, there were no changes; it remained calm, only emitting energy waves at regular intervals, spaced 1.58 seconds apart.

And a piece of news almost arrived with him at the Star Gate --

[The Empire has announced the establishment of an internal inspection agency within the Mechanic Association to conduct a thorough investigation of mechanics within its borders. Any violations of imperial law will be dealt with harshly!]

It finally came, Li Ming thought as he read the statement.

The Empire’s announcement caused a massive stir across the interstellar space.

"The wording is quite harsh..." Li Ming pondered; as the saying goes, players united are strong. The Mechanical community is enormous, and their interests solidified are quite significant.

To deal with them harshly would cripple even a small civilization, let alone advanced civilizations up to a Star Cluster Level Civilization.

But the Empire, two years ago, had already distanced itself from the Mechanic Association due to the Forging Hammer Divine Craftsman incident, after an initial reorganization.

It hadn’t caused much of a stir, but attracted the attention of mechanics from other civilizations, unaware of what occurred.

Then, three days later, the situation changed, as if pre-planned, the Star Cluster Republic Alliance and Eternal Brilliance Federation referenced the Empire’s announcement and also declared their intention to jointly inspect mechanics within their borders.

Many mechanics were still bewildered; wasn’t it an internal inspection of the Empire, why did everyone suddenly comply?

What terrified them even more was that within one short day, countless civilizations across interstellar space responded, declaring that they would also conduct investigations and deal with them severely.

If one civilization acted, there would be strong resistance. Even low-level mechanics held significant power within their native civilizations, with complex networks.

These individuals were essentially the backbone of their civilizations, providing substantial taxes, GDP, and employment; to touch them would be like killing a thousand enemies, injuring oneself by eight hundred.

But such an almost entire interstellar united pressure was terrifying; no one dared not fear it.

Even the most notorious Raiders or terrorist organizations in interstellar space had never faced such universal outcry.

Many life forms cheered loudly, claiming these mechanics monopolized many resources and were akin to local tyrants in small civilizations.

For a moment, there was a sentiment of "the mechanics association has long been a bane of the interstellar."