Shepherding Humanity

Xu Zhi had thought about this very thoroughly. If you could create a “living ship”, then creating a synthetic “living island” that could fly should also be possible.

“If it can be done, then I’ll no longer have to worry about The Land of the Gods, ‘Achilles’.”

Xu Zhi was delighted.

This plan must go forward no matter what!

If it works, it’ll turn another page in the history of evolution.

As for how much time, effort, and resources this would demand from those hundred players?

Why should Xu Zhi care?

They were the ones who would be exhausted anyway.

“Gotta put it on the agenda!”

Xu Zhi skimmed through the other papers. Most of them were pretty good, and may indeed create species with extraordinary powers.

Compared to last time, when they couldn’t prepare at all, the papers this time were much higher in quality.

The Hive Mind's mechanical voice interrupted his thoughts:

“If this plan succeeds, then as the Tyranis Queen, you should completely devote yourself to evolving extraordinary powers in biological life-forms…”

“Please call me the Tyranis King.”

Xu Zhi laughed. “These 50 papers are good enough, make the announcement. The third beta test starts at 6:00 tomorrow, same as last time.

“Understood.”

After doing all this, Xu Zhi indifferently looked at the larger sandbox.

Another day has passed, which was equivalent to over a hundred years in the Magic World. “This guy has been inside for two days. Our dear transmigrator, the Emperor of Alchemy, should be over 200 years old. How will he act in his old age?”

Xu Zhi felt that, like the previous two monarchs, this person would surely act up before his death.

Gilgamesh had pointed his sword at God in his old age.

The Three Witches prayed for an audience with God in their twilight years.

“This great emperor won’t get desperate and try to f*ck with me before he dies, right?”

Xu Zhi had a headache.

The founder of each dynasty was a majestic and amazing individual who dominated their era, and Xu Zhi naturally favored them. But every one of them had gotten restless in their old age, and he had to be very careful lest they catch him off-guard.

He had just finished dealing with Akina’s Speedster, and ascertained that he was not causing any trouble… And now, he had to deal with this crap.

Even the natives were absurdly competent, who knew what a transmigrator would be capable of??

But after Xu Zhi has observed him for a few seconds, he laughed out loud.

Grantham simply didn’t have the leisure to cause Xu Zhi any trouble. At the moment, he was in great danger.

“Bro, you had a miserable beginning, and your Slime species became slaves and ‘X-Rated Goods’. After ninety years of patient struggle, you finally became strong enough to defeat Medusa, and started your glorious life as the Great Emperor, but that did not last very long. You’ve grown weak in your old age, and now all the major powers in this world have gathered to kill you!”

…..

The Magic World, Kingdom of Babylon, year 523.

The Emperor of Alchemy was now 221. This invincible emperor who reigned over the Three Great Kingdoms often stood on a high cliff atop the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, surveying the Magic World’s vast territory. At this moment, his solemn eyes were tinged with anxiety.

“It’s taking too long! I’ve logged out several times but they still haven’t gotten any results yet…”

These past few years, people have begun to notice that, although the Emperor of Alchemy was still young and handsome, with the body of a Greek god, his aura was gradually weakening; it no longer had the terrifying coercive pressure that made the entire world want to kneel at his feet.

“The Emperor of Alchemy’s lifespan may be coming to an end!”

This was the conjecture of a Fifth Level Wizard.

This news spread like wildfire in the various Magic Academies, Mage Clans, and Alchemy Labs throughout the Three Kingdoms.

“The Emperor of Alchemy has had a long and accomplished reign of 131 years! He opened the Gates of Truth, created the two Alchemical Wonders of the World, started the Golden Age of Alchemy, and has now lived for 221 years. If you think about it, the Three Witches only lived to the age of 240.”

“The great emperor who reigns over the entire world has grown old!”

“Although the Emperor of Alchemy defeated the Empress of Death, Medusa, unlike her, he's still only Level Six, and won't live much longer than 250 years.”

“Who in this world doesn’t die one day? Even the grandest of monarchs who rule over a vast territory must return to the dirt in the end! First, there was Gilgamesh from the ancient Sumerian myths, then the Three Witches who founded Babylon, and now, there is the Emperor of Alchemy…”

In the great kingdoms, people from all walks of life mournfully sighed and grieved the end of an era.

Meanwhile, various forces—including the evil Rose Sect, which had gone into hiding—have begun to move.

The Emperor of Alchemy was mighty; whether they were friend or foe, no one could deny this. He reigned supreme in this world, and none dared to defy him.

But, this was only when he was younger. Now that he was about to die of old age, who would become the next ruler of this world?

In the Rose Kingdom on the mountain peak.

Over the years, orthodox witches have completely taken over and the current Rose Kingdom was no different than the Kingdom of Babylon; but there were still remnants of the evil witches lurking in the shadows.

In an extremely well-concealed cellar with walls the color of dried blood.

“The Emperor of Alchemy’s fearsome prowess is comparable to a pinnacle Epic Level Seven, but in the end, he… is only a Sixth Level Wizard. Our empress, Medusa, is a true Seventh Level Epic Witch with a long lifespan. Even though she has been sealed, she is still in her prime…”

“In the past years, some of us have also reached the Legendary Sixth Level. We could go to the dark land on the other side of Oceanus—Gorgon Island, and try to rescue the former Empress of Death, Medusa, by attacking her seal from both sides.”

The “Rose Saviors” hidden cult was led by the remnants of the fallen kingdom of evil witches.

They only had eight members, and each member was a wanted witch who was Level Five and above. There were even genius witches who had defected from the Academies among them.

After this day, they divided themselves into four pairs. Each of them wore concealing robes decorated with roses, a scarlet witch’s hat, and a magic crest on their chest with a slash mark on it to symbolize their status as renegades.

They traveled along the coastline, from port to port, assassinating royal ministers and sneaking into Magic Academies in order to gather information on Gorgon Island’s seal.

Boom!

That night, the sound of explosions shook the Royal Rose Academy's Magic Library of Truth. The clouds above were pierced by several bright columns of light, and a gray film suddenly covered the sky.

“Enemy attack!!”

As this loud alert resounded throughout the Magic Academy, bright flames lit up in the night.

“Who dares to invade our Academy? I, Morseus, shall face you with my spear of fire!”

The patrolling instructor confidently walked out of the library.

Morseus wore an instructor's dark blue robes, and his body was wrapped in black flames. His hawk-like gaze instantly focused on one of the two women in front of him. “My genius apprentice, Charlotte, who defected from the Academy three years ago, you’ve finally returned.”

“Prioritize our objective. I’ll deal with the instructor!”

Charlotte’s companion was a renegade witch who wore a black eyepatch and wielded a bizarre cane that also doubled as a matchette. She was about to step forward, but was held back by Charlotte.

Charlotte lowered her gaze for a moment, before slowly looking up at her former mentor, “Instructor, although you were renowned as The Blazing Gale, you have fallen behind the times. You are no match for me, leave now if you don’t want to die…”

Boom!

Her words were interrupted by a wave of flames.

“How foolish.” Charlotte angrily roused her spiritual power and counter-attacked.

“Thirty Days of Darkness!! Charlotte, you actually completed this taboo spell!!!” Morseus roared in anger.

Meanwhile…

“That moonlight… It’s the Eye of Darkness!”

Ermin was sitting in front of her moonlit window and looking up at the fearsome light in the sky.

She quickly got up, closed her thick black spellbook, and shivered.

“It’s Charlotte Shylock, the creator of the Mystic Eye and the founder of Ocular Magic! So, the peerless genius who defected from the Academy three years ago is back…”

She reminisced of the old days, when they were still a happy witch trio.

The three of them had performed their tasks under the guidance of their mentor, Morseus. There was herself—the bottom-of-the-class dummy, the kind and innocent healer Lucy, and the aloof Charlotte, who had a perfect score in all subjects and was known throughout the Academy as a once-in-a-century genius.

“That flame must be our instructor attacking her… Then…”

Ermin had a bad premonition and hurried to the library. There, she saw Morseus—one of the Academy’s strongest genius Level Five instructors—lying in a pool of blood. This kind of injury could only be caused by Charlotte’s Eye of Darkness.

Ermin trembled and fell to her knees. “Instructor, after joining the Rose Saviors, she’s grown this strong in the past three years? To have beaten you this easily…”

“That girl has stolen some of our Academy’s information on Gorgon Island. She is planning to unseal the Empress of Death, Medusa, and overturn the world’s order by killing our aging emperor, Grantham!”

Morseus gravely spoke as his eyes began to dim. He looked at Ermin, his student who lacked talent but was the most hard-working of them all. “Go! Take whatever you need from the Academy, and embark on your journey. Protect our emperor… and stop Charlotte—my former apprentice, and your fallen best friend.”

A few moments later, in the Academy Plaza.

The Director of the Magic Academy urgently launched the plan for the "Emergency Retrieval of the Book of Seals”. He dispatched three teams of elite students, each led by one of the Academy’s special instructors, to pursue the renegade witch, Charlotte.

Half a day later, in front of a foaming waterfall.

Charlotte looked up in surprise at the people chasing after her. The beautiful Ermin was among them, her face full of hostility.

“Ermin, you can’t stop the Rose Saviors. Although the Emperor of Alchemy is both benevolent and wise, and the era of alchemy he started has benefited us all… we still have to kill him!”

…..

The Nephthys Beastmen Kingdom.

Emery, the king of harpies, was sitting quietly on a high place overlooking the entire Beastmen Capital of Nephthys.

“It’s the Rose Saviors again. I must send people to prevent them from unsealing the Empress of Death and release Medusa back into the world. Furthermore, I’m going to the Babylonian royal capital to assassinate the Emperor of Alchemy.”

He, Emery, King of the Beastmen, was a pinnacle Sixth Level Wizard, and was one of the strongest wizards in the world besides the Emperor of Alchemy. The people of the Beastmen Kingdom called him The Essence of Venom.

“Your majesty, your opponent is the legendary Emperor of Alchemy who has the fearsome prowess of an Epic Level Seven. Even if he’s getting old…”

Countless ministers tried to dissuade him.

They understood that Grantham, even in his twilight years, was still an unfathomable existence and the most powerful being in the world. The difference between each Level was insurmountable: a Level Seven could easily slaughter hundreds of Level Six wizards.

Unfortunately for them, their king had a death wish.

Although the Emperor of Alchemy commanded everyone to treat the Beastmen as equals, many orthodox witches still looked down on them for being a product of the evil witches’ alchemical experiments.

They were a deformed and unnatural species, and human ethics did not apply to them. They were base, vulgar, and ugly creatures who were hated by all. There were people who even called them the misbegotten crossbreeds of monsters and beasts behind their backs.

Many unscrupulous orthodox witches would hunt them in secret and sell them in the underground slave markets. What awaited them after that was death in the fighting pits amidst the cheering of nobles.

The unluckier ones would simply be killed, their body parts turned into alchemical ingredients used in the making of magic staves, wizard robes, and various alchemical tools.

Countless Beastmen have lost their lives and loved ones because of this.

“Everything is for the enduring glory of the Beastmen Kingdom!!! If we win, Beastmen will become the masters of the next era…”

Emery snarled, flames blazing in his eyes. “Although the Emperor of Alchemy has been a very good friend to the Beastmen, treating us very kindly while also creating many policies to promote equality… we still have to kill him!!!”