Chapter 1

"Huff…"

The heavy breathing sounded like a broken bellows, a hoarse sound mixed with the sticky feeling of blood phlegm clinging to his throat.

*Pa*, the mask stained with traces of splattered blood fell off, leaning against the corner of the table. Through the narrow eyeholes, one could see the room riddled with holes, full of traces of battle. Dozens of corpses lay silently on the ground, the pool of blood gradually widening. In the entire central control room, only the leader was still standing. All the executives had died under his fists. The horrified expressions of the senior officials were still frozen on their faces, all devoid of breath.

The leader spat out a mouthful of bloody phlegm, took a deep breath. The strong smell of blood in the room stimulated his nasal cavity. He suddenly coughed violently for a full two minutes before stopping.

The fierce battle had triggered his hidden injuries. In the ambush battle more than a month ago, he was severely injured by Han Xiao and hadn't had time to recuperate, which eventually became a chronic ailment.

Every time he felt the faint pain, he couldn't help but think of Han Xiao. He owed his current situation entirely to Han Xiao. Even now, he was still full of hatred, but this intense emotion was no longer surging, leaving only emptiness.

The leader went to the main control console, adjusted the nuclear launch options, then took off his gloves and verified his fingerprint, iris, permissions, and passcodes. Two keys were inserted into the holes, and as long as they were each rotated one hundred and eighty degrees, the launch would be activated. At the last step, his scarred fingers pinched the keys, but he hesitated to turn them.

The leader leaned against the chair, looked up, his eyes unfocused, seemingly in a daze, not knowing what he was thinking.

"Beep beep beep—"

A small screen appeared in the corner of the screen, showing a call request. The caller was none other than "Zero".

The leader was expressionless and pressed "Accept". Han Xiao's face popped up on the big screen.

Seeing the corpses all over the floor, Han Xiao raised an eyebrow. He initiated the communication, firstly, to see the attitude of the Germination side, and secondly, to see the leader one last time. But this scene made him basically understand the situation, and he shook his head and said, "It seems you've already decided."

The leader's eyes revealed a look of disappointment.

"I didn't expect to lose to you in the end. You… ant. One wrong step leads to another. Everything I had has been destroyed by you… What do you want now? To confirm your victory? I'm here, you can look all you want. My life, the destruction of Germination, will add a thick stroke to your deeds. You are the winner, naturally you have the right to appreciate your spoils."

"I told you, this starry sky is very big. This planet is just a speck of dust, and no one in the universe cares about the big things that happen here." Han Xiao shook his head. The great enemy had been resolved, but his expression was very calm. After all, he was a man who looked to the stars and the sea. He slowly said, "I just think, after doing so many things, it must be hard to keep it all bottled up before you die."

"You want me to confide in my mortal enemy?" The leader grinned, his ferocious appearance becoming even more ugly. He leaned lazily on the chair, his body relaxed. "That's really interesting."

Han Xiao shrugged and went straight to the point. "What's the deal with the Sons of Destiny?"

The leader laughed loudly, stopped after a while, and shook his head. "Sons of Destiny are just pitiful worms. They can see the future, influence destiny, but they can't control their own lives. They are destined to be tools in the hands of others… You also have precognitive abilities, maybe the Sons of Destiny are your final fate!"

Han Xiao remained noncommittal and said, "Tell me about yourself. You seem to be a Goran?"

The leader's face changed, and he murmured, "You found out… Yes, I used to be a Goran. At that time, I was still a young man, passionate and indignant. When the Ming Moke incident broke out in the country, I joined the resistance organization. I marched, protested, opposed, and wanted to save my country from a corrupt government."

"However, the war broke out suddenly. Ruilan invaded. Under internal and external troubles, my country was crushed, and everyone perished…" The leader's tone suddenly became gnashing. "Did you hear that? We were called 'internal troubles'! Was I wrong? Was resistance wrong? No! Our original intention was just to fight for the rights we deserved! Just to make our country better!"

"We were infinitely close to victory. The dawn was clearly in sight, but the war ruined everything. Goran was destroyed, and all my friends were executed. People like this who don't know their place are best dealt with by eliminating them. The surviving Goran people were like castrated livestock, forced to become docile, easy to manage and use. Only a very few people managed to escape, and I was one of them."

"I'm not a big shot, I'm just an ordinary young man, alone, not knowing where to go, like a walking corpse, until I saw the Goran border being blocked by Ruilan, and the flag I was familiar with being burned, replaced by the Ruilan flag. That's when I woke up. I knew what mission I was carrying."

"Although Goran is not perfect, with this and that shortcomings and darkness, it is still my country. The hatred of national subjugation can only be avenged…

With tooth for tooth, with blood for blood!"

The leader exhaled a turbid breath, his gaze drifting away, the past scenes seemed to emerge before his eyes.

"But in the torrent of the times, an ordinary young man is just duckweed, life is as fragile as an ant. In order to cross the war zone, I dragged my tired body, moving from one refugee camp to another. I was treated like a pig or a dog, numbly enduring a life without dignity, but my blood was burning. No matter what the danger, I told myself to live on. Hatred filled my heart, and it kept my heartbeat from stopping… Finally, I managed to cross the most intense battle zone, without stopping or seeking shelter. I turned to the wilderness."

"I knew that without power, how could I talk about revenge, so I survived in the wilderness, fighting with beasts, treating myself as a stubborn iron, tempered and refined."

Speaking of this, the leader pointed to the scars on his face and hands, and said lightly, "One hundred and seventy-six scars, I exchanged them for strength."

Han Xiao raised his eyebrows. "So you really were just an ordinary person?"

The leader asked, "Why can't I be an ordinary person?"

After thinking about it, Han Xiao nodded, signaling him to continue his performance.

The leader continued, "When I was in the wilderness, I kept thinking. When I returned to the battlefield, I heard that the Ming Moke organization still existed. How ironic, a tool born for terrorist rule became the purest Goran force that survived. So a plan emerged in my heart. I assassinated the leader of Ming Moke, renamed the organization Germination, hid it, and developed it silently. I also put on a mask."

"War is full of opportunities, countless people lose their countries and are displaced. So I set the idea of Germination, drawing them a big cake, to create a so-called new world… Ideologies have always been able to drive those who resonate with them. It's not that I used the subjugated people, but that they willingly let me use them. This is hatred. They don't even care whether they can achieve their goals after they sacrifice themselves."

"Elevate my personal desires to the desires of a group, and I can get a lot of help. This is how Germination absorbs the nutrients of war, grows rapidly, takes root and sprouts, and grows into a towering tree, a behemoth."

The leader's tone was full of hatred, but also lost. The cause he had always adhered to was destroyed by others. In addition to anger, the taste was extremely complex.

"And then… you appeared."

"You cut down the tree."