The Almighty Ring

Jiang Fei repeated the statement, “Stop them from reaching the endgame?”

At that moment, he had an epiphany.

Isabella chimed in, “If we try anything to stop the players from leaving the safe zone, it would incur their wrath. However, we can try something else—to slowly stop them from a certain distance away from the spawning ground.”

“Should we spread this news? I think we could unite the entire universe,” suggested Ariel.

“We need to tell everyone about this but uniting all civilizations is another matter entirely. They might not believe this news to be true in the first place. That’s problem number one. Number two, there are civilizations that have been at war with each other for millennia. They won’t put aside their grudges just because of a common enemy,” said Jiang Fei.

“But, this is an attack on the entire universe! We have a common enemy,” stressed Ariel.

“What does it matter? A common enemy means nothing if it means they can’t have their revenge. Everyone has been killing each other for so long, the blood that has been spilt could form planets. I have seen them at war with each other and I can safely say that they will not forgo their vengeance so easily.”

“What can we do then…” said Ariel dejectedly.

“Actually, I’ve thought about this. We can just spend the rest of our lives here on Earth, until the end of the world,” suggested Jiang Fei.

Earth was located on the far edge of the known universe and even if there were hostile players from the higher dimension, it would take them more than a few millennia before they could find this planet.

“No! I can’t accept this. I do not like the idea of just sitting around and doing nothing!” said Isabella.

She had always been the kind of person who wanted to face her troubles head-on. Staying home and cowering in fear had never been Isabella’s style.

“There’s a second choice,” said Jiang Fei, adding onto his previous suggestion, “We retaliate. Even though I have no idea how we can possibly win this fight, there might be a chance of gathering more information if we ‘interact’ with those pan-dimensional beings. Perhaps we can even find a way for all of us to survive.”

Sylphy made her own suggestion, “That’s true! Just like we did previously, we can even leave this universe and enter the higher dimension!”

The girls were once NPCs who had been ‘rescued’ from the game by Jiang Fei. If he could do that, perhaps there was a way for them to get out of this dimension too!

“Brilliant!” exclaimed Jiang Fei.

That was his epiphany. So far, it seemed impossible for him to transmigrate the people of this dimension into a higher dimension. That being said, Sylphy’s idea had given him hope. He now had a final goal to achieve.

When Jiang Fei entered the world of Dawn Break, he too was considered a player, a being from a higher dimension. With 0541’s technological assistance, he managed to bring Isabella and the others into the real world. Similarly, the inhabitants of the Gamma Dimension might also have a way to extract people from this dimension into theirs.

“Fei, do you think we can escape into the higher dimension through the super wormhole you mentioned earlier?” asked Hua Mulan.

“I’ve not considered that. The problem lies with that golden barrier. If we can’t re-enter the Alpha Sector, there’s no way we can traverse the wormhole,” replied Jiang Fei.

“I think that barrier might be a temporary setup. It might disappear once the ‘players’ have achieved a higher level,” suggested Ariel.

Jiang Fei sighed. “Let’s hope so.”

Everything seemed innocent and simple now when everyone was discussing it, but he knew that reality would not be that simple.

“Assuming that the barrier is permanent, it is an indication that the Gamma Dimension inhabitants value the wormhole to a certain extent that it requires protection. Thus, if we can break through that barrier, we might be able to traverse the wormhole and exit into the higher dimension,” said Ariel.

Jiang Fei agreed, “Sounds plausible.”

That was the least of their problems. He worried about the nature of the wormhole—whether it was traversable both ways or just a single path, from the higher dimension to the lower dimension, not the other way around.

Nevertheless, Jiang Fei decided to keep that thought to himself. The atmosphere had never been this tense and he needed to keep morales high.

He realized that he had been constantly shooting down ideas suggested by the girls. If he continued to reject all their ideas, they might actually think that there was no reason to continue fighting the invaders.

Nina paced closer to Jiang Fei and gently patted his shoulder. “I for one feel lucky enough to just be by your side. As long as we are together, everything is going to be alright.”

“I feel the same. As long as I am with you darling, come hell or high water, we will pull through no matter what,” said Sylphy, coming up behind Jiang Fei and burying her face in his back.

“So… I believe you’re saying, we should all try to fight back?” asked Jiang Fei.

He knew what the girls were thinking but he wanted to hear them say it.

“Yes. We are in this together! Might as well see it through together as well!” said Isabella, speaking on behalf of everyone.

“Good… I needed that. We’ll take a few days off and leave Earth after,” declared Jiang Fei.

He was disgruntled about the revelation, but since the girls had decided to support him through thick and thin, he no longer had any reason to doubt anything.

“Do you have a plan in mind?” asked Nina.

She was the wisest of all amongst his harem.

“So far, I don’t. Do you have any suggestions?”

“I strongly feel that we should not be at the front lines. At least, not this soon. You suggested that we should contact the players from the Gamma Dimension, but I believe that the result of establishing contact with those players will be bad. You were once a player and I trust that you can see things from a player’s perspective,” said Nina.

Nina’s tone was calm but her words still slightly embarrassed Jiang Fei. Despite her not being direct, Jiang Fei understood the underlying warning she was trying to convey.

For players, killing anything in a game would not cause them to feel any guilt. In fact, players are encouraged to kill more to gain rewards and experience points. No one would sheath their swords in an RPG world, as they were surrounded by nothing but digitally created avatars. That is, from a player’s perspective.

“I understand. In that case, we should first start by improving our strength. To be brutally honest, compared to the other civilizations out there, we are incredibly weak,” said Jiang Fei.

At his current strength, he was not suitable to be at the front lines. Jiang Fei was not a powerful fighter. In fact, he was not even strong enough to be considered as the strongest in any galaxy. Theon was, but Jiang Fei was sure that there were others out there who were stronger than himself.

As such, if he could not even count himself as Theon’s equal, all those who were under him could not do so either. Currently, Bison and Kaa’Ina were the only two strong fighters under his banner. The rest of his forces were nothing to be impressed by.

Not to mention, Jiang Fei was without a fleet of ships. The closest thing he had to a fleet was Meteor, the Hypercruiser-turned-troop carrier, and Braveheart, an obsolete ship.

Lockseed may have dispatched a fleet to support him, but they were by no means under Jiang Fei’s command. If he conformed to the Trade Federation, he might gain control of the aforementioned fleet, but if he decided to go against them, he would be left without a fleet.

Hence, the most rational move he could make now was to strengthen himself and his girls. For now, he would leave matters about the invaders from a higher dimension to parties who could handle such threats.