Blue Earth.
Li Bei sat silently by the window, contemplating life.
Unit Four's mission was complete. After leaving behind a complete mess, she chose to directly flee back to Blue Earth. Now, it was foreseeable that in the near future, an Astral Express carrying a full trainload of lunatics would surely crash into Blue Earth...
But thinking carefully, what else could they do? Just go mad, that's all. Were there few people going mad on this doomed planet already?
Internally, there was the Otto trio and those lunatics from the Previous Era. Externally, Kevin wandered around daily. Few among them had normal brains. Since Blue Earth could survive even under such high pressure, adding a few more probably wouldn't be a problem... likely.
After all, even if there was a problem, Li Bei couldn't do anything about it now. The Astral Express crashing into Blue Earth was inevitable; he couldn't stop it.
As for why he was so certain... Because that damned future premonition activated again. Just now, as the fourth alt's journey ended and he opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was the future scene of the train from the sky crashing into the earth like a meteor.
But there was nothing to panic about. After all, now boosted by Unit Four, Twilight, his strength had advanced by leaps and bounds. Even Kevin, whom he couldn't defeat before, was nothing special before him now—being a Candidate for Divinity meant being this willful.
The only problem was how to handle these guys. After all, Li Bei wasn't some devil. These people were all his alts' beloved family and friends, sworn brothers. He couldn't just kill them all. But given these people's madness, as long as they weren't dead, they would surely cause trouble until death...
But thanks to Unit One's efforts, at least the Otto trio's mental state was quite stable now. Those few from the Previous Era also seemed much more normal.
Unit One truly deserved to be the eldest sister at home. Li Hua, having raised Otto and Kallen since childhood, perhaps possessed some kind of affinity that could guide those people's mental states back onto the right track. As the saying goes, the capable should do more work.
Therefore, in Li Bei's current view, Li Hua still had much room for development. Conveniently, he had just strengthened her; let her continue shining in the upcoming scenes.
After resolving to continue dumping future troubles onto Li Hua, Li Bei's mood instantly brightened. Leaning back in his chair, he snapped his fingers and called out the system. "Alright, System, tell me the total energy harvested this time."
"Host, aren't you being a bit too arrogant... So certain of a bountiful harvest?"
Facing the system's doubt, Li Bei smirked. "This is confidence brought by strength, okay?"
Unit Four was a huge gamble. Creating the account initially spent almost all his energy. And instead of steadily shearing wool from people he saw, he targeted the players on Blue Earth. If it failed, it would mean losing everything—but thankfully, he won again this time.
"This time's income, even without counting the loose change, is one hundred and thirty million... Have to say, Host, you truly have the makings of a natural bad woman!"
Ignoring the system's teasing, Li Bei looked at the long string of numbers in his balance, finally nodding with satisfaction. "What bad woman? I merely did a little insignificant wool-shearing work."
He hadn't checked the players' comments and words online yet, but he could guess it was already a scene of widespread mourning, with everyone cursing Mihoyo vehemently.
Indeed, the adventure was worth it. The emotional fluctuation of one player losing their cyber waifu might not be much. But hundreds of thousands, millions of players combined, could provide far more energy than those protagonists.
Especially the death of a character who genuinely accompanied them in the game; the shock for players must be greater than someone else's waifu dying—at least the energy they burst forth faithfully reflected this.
So much energy, just looking at it brought a sense of security—unfortunately, before he could even warm it up, it had to be spent.
"System, redeem the world template," Though feeling the pinch, Li Bei didn't hesitate. After all, the reason he went all-in creating Unit Four back then was precisely for this moment.
A huge sum of one hundred million, now to be easily spent just to prevent the world from becoming Earth 2.0 overrun by Honkai... Li Bei's feelings were extremely complex. He was just an ordinary person wanting to live a peaceful life; why did he now have to worry about things like defending Blue Earth?
But if he didn't care, then later Blue Earth would also have Herrschers and Honkai popping up daily, making it impossible for him to live normally, which would be too annoying.
The usable world templates now, after removing Honkai, only left Unit Two's Chainsaw Man world and Unit Four's Star Rail world. Compared to a bunch of devils running around the streets, Li Bei ultimately chose the relatively more reliable Star Rail world.
Although things like Aeons and Stellarons made one's scalp tingle, the current Blue Earth world had neither Aeons nor Stellarons; considering those things was for the distant future.
As for interstellar isolation... Blue Earth was currently far from achieving space travel; considering this was truly too early. Besides, the Astral Express was about to crash over soon anyway; pioneering new worlds then would fit their expertise perfectly.
"Host, the world is about to Earth upgrading now. The commotion might be a little big."
As Li Bei redeemed the world template and initiated its use, the next moment he felt everything around him begin to shake violently—but this wasn't an earthquake, but the entire world trembling!
If an earthquake caused such a situation, all skyscrapers would likely collapse in an instant. Yet now, everything remained as usual; the only ones feeling the change were humans.
Fortunately, the tremors stopped quickly, and the resulting panic didn't spread too widely. Li Bei looked up at the sky's scenery, his originally calm expression now looking like he had eaten a bug.
The reason was none other than the originally blue sky now seemed to have a mirage-like overlay, faintly reflecting another inverted city filled with skyscrapers.
"System... You're not going to tell me this is the special effect after loading the world template, are you?"
"No, no, no, that is another world. Its plane was just too close to Blue Earth's, and now they've finally made contact," Looking at the city reflection in the sky, the system's tone held a hint of relief. "Thankfully, it was a peaceful docking, didn't crash directly... The position between the two worlds should be relatively stable now. Later, perhaps fixed passages might even form, allowing free travel between the two sides."
"...Although I think I already know the answer, I'll ask anyway—There's only one world that would stick this close, right?" Li Bei rubbed his faintly aching stomach.
"Maybe only one, but only one is unlikely..."
"Not surprising at all..."
Li Bei sighed wearily. Who could have imagined that Blue Earth, just a short while ago, was a place where winning 2 billion could let someone happily consider a peaceful life?
Dammit, going to become a world transit hub now, right...
"I guess this world also belongs to one of my old acquaintances, right?"
"Congratulations, Host! You've even learned to answer before the question is asked!"
(End of Volume IV: Voyage to the Terminus)