A significant portion of why Chen Luo's home world rapidly advanced to a mid-tier world was due to his actions, which facilitated the game's enhancement of the world's Great Source power.
However, Lord Dragon Nine artificially severed this path. The human race's evaluation for the entire world had not improved even slightly since the arrival of the Doomsday Game.
There were two points that even Lord Dragon Nine found particularly ingenious.
One was the design of the Apostle-level beings!
The enhancement of the human race's power would naturally lead to an increase in their racial evaluation. Theoretically, a multitude of second-tier Apostles should have elevated the racial evaluation to an extremely high level from the outset.
But what if these Apostles did not belong to the human race? Under the path deliberately skewed by Dragon Nine, human souls, fueled by endless combustion, merged into external objects forged from Heart Soul Steel.
While seemingly gaining immortal bodies, they, in substance, abandoned their human identity. Their souls, too, were twisted into monstrous entities by the fundamental curse of countless fellow human souls!
Therefore, any Apostle who advanced through the sacrifice of their life was no longer considered human and was not counted by the system in the evaluation of this world's human race!
Even Dragon Nine, an Apostle-level being who advanced independently, was no longer considered human! For from the moment he changed his name under the will of the Great Lord, his true identity became a designated vessel for the arrival of a Void Great Lord.
Another point that prevented the world's advancement was the consumption of the human population!
With a population in the hundreds of billions, the Great Source of Game World No. 9 had expanded to the brink of advancement. However, Lord Dragon Nine did not wish for the world to truly advance.
After all, upon advancement, the allocated quotas would be entirely different. Moreover, the enhancement of a mid-tier world's Great Source was not as simple as that of a lower-tier world; even Great Lords would find it difficult to manipulate.
In such a scenario, Dragon Nine's plan to secretly increase the world's Great Source quota and monopolize more Great Source would be wasted.
The solution to this problem was simple! If there were too many people, just kill them!
The soul consumption of the True Guard-level beings was merely a minor factor; those Apostles were the scythes in the Great Lord's hands!
To maintain their existence, these Apostles required the consumption of vast numbers of humans every day!
Under the will of Lord Dragon Nine, not a single Apostle felt anything unusual about this act of harming their own kind. For them, it had become as natural as breathing.
The existence of the Nine Great Battlefields was also a result of Dragon Nine's influence.
He utilized the cubes that were cast from the origin, which not only carried the Void Serpent but also possessed the ability to influence space.
By using these, he fixed the locations where monsters descended, thereby preventing other Great Lords' dependents from reporting the true situation of this world.
Pity the man whose name was erased. To his death, he believed he was saving the world.
How foolish.
"Haha, this Great Source, so incredibly abundant! Based on the standard quantity, it should be close to over nine hundred portions of Great Source power!"
Lord Dragon Nine greedily gazed at the faint white light emanating from beyond the planet, which was the World Fetus transformed from Great Source power.
Now, observing it up close, Dragon Nine easily discerned the storage capacity of Great Source power within this world's Great Source.
"According to the protocol, the Great Source power of a lower-tier world is set at one hundred portions as the base. As the promoter of this world, I am entitled to thirty percent of the profits, with the remaining seventy percent to be distributed among the other Great Lords."
"Heh, but seventy portions of Great Source power, how generous to these ravenous wolves!"
"Haha, the remaining over eight hundred portions of Great Source power are all mine!!!"
"It was worth it for me to partition my origin and deploy so many resources in advance for this layout!"
Game World No. 9, locked in place by the cubes, seemed to sense a fatal crisis, and its World Fetus, acting as protection, began to tremble slightly.
But this tremor only made Lord Dragon Nine more excited.
Nine sinister dragon heads stretched wantonly across the River of the Void. Where their obsidian fangs passed, even the highly dense outer void was torn into fissures:
"Haha! You are afraid?! You, this ignorant and naive lower-tier world, have actually begun to develop emotions akin to individual life?"
"You should be grateful to me! If not for me allowing you to advance to the level of a mid-tier world, you would likely have remained an unfeeling Great Source until your death!!"
"However, your fear is also the best reward for me!"
Within his crimson dragon eyes, greed and covetousness were rife. Gazing at the planet so close at hand, he could barely contain his ravenous appetite!
But fear was an excellent seasoning, and Dragon Nine desired a more stimulating flavor!
"Be afraid! Be terrified! Wallow in despair!! I will tear apart everything you possess bit by bit! You shall meet your demise in the throes of extreme agony!!!"
"The will of a Great Lord is absolute! Your fate was sealed from the very beginning!"
——————
While Lord Dragon Nine was orchestrating the entire world, extreme panic also gripped the world's inhabitants.
The flesh and blood of countless monsters carpeted the land and sea. The thick stench of blood made the citizens of the surviving New City feel as if they were in hell.
However, before they could recover from the shock of the monsters' sudden demise, an incredibly sinister voice slowly resounded from outside the world.
Lord Dragon Nine's declaration to the world was also a declaration to the beings within it.
Even as a mere vessel, this body carried a trace of Great Lord-level might.
With Lord Dragon Nine's words, the remaining billions of humans were plunged into endless terror. As their fear spread, the Great Source was also tainted in return!
A portion of Great Source infused with fear was a rare delicacy for Dragon Nine, who controlled the authority over negative aspects.
He did not mind spending a little time to add a bit of seasoning before devouring it.
Within the resistance army's headquarters,
The people looked up at the sky outside the world with utter horror, beholding the colossal nine-headed evil dragon.
If not for the World Fetus blocking the vast majority of the pollution, merely gazing upon it would have been enough to cause irreversible mutation!
Yet, even with most of the monstrous voice blocked, it still caused the humans in this place to emit inhuman screams.
All humans who heard the Great Lord's voice were inevitably plunged into inescapable fear!
Even the four True Guard-level battle armors began to tremble faintly.
At this moment, a clear, crisp shout echoed from above the city:
"Domain Expansion! Absolute Ice Barrier!!"
The next instant, a transparent ice barrier materialized from the void. The intangible domain power, under the Dragon Girl's will, transformed into a barrier that separated the heavens.
Protected by the domain power, the ordinary citizens within the city, with lingering fear, finally recovered from their endless terror.
With a flash, Xiaoyue, with beast ears and white fur, flickered beside the Dragon Girl, saying with some concern,
"Longlong, this monster's aura seems similar to the big fellow Master fought before. And Master's aura has been gone for a while; I'm a bit scared. Longlong, is Master going to be alright?"
The Dragon Girl casually tapped the little wolf's head. After gaining dragon bloodline, this fellow had become much closer to her. The name "Longlong" was something she allowed her to call her:
"Don't worry, he's our Master. He'll definitely be alright!"
The Dragon Girl comforted Xiaoyue, but a trace of worry inevitably appeared in her gaze as she looked towards the sky.
Another Great Lord? But this world's Great Source is far too weak this time.
Master, please don't be in any danger!