Chapter 168: Angel Mercenary Corps

"What do you see?"
His Majesty, the God of Knowledge and Diplomacy, asked Sun Licheng.
At this moment, Sun Licheng in the sea of consciousness had his eyes tightly closed, floating mid-air while radiating a brilliant white light.
"I see danger—immense danger,"
Sun Licheng replied, a trace of trembling evident in his voice.
The expression of His Majesty the God of Knowledge and Diplomacy instantly darkened.
Although Sun Licheng was merely a goblin who resembled an elf, he possessed power that approached divinity. In other words, whatever the deities could perceive was roughly equivalent to what Sun Licheng could perceive. If Sun Licheng perceived immense danger, then this danger was unquestionably extraordinary.
"This is troublesome. Sun Licheng, I believe this danger is certainly not something a mere minor necromancer could cause; there must be hidden depths to this matter,"
the divine majesty awakened Sun Licheng and spoke to him in a solemn tone.
As the person directly involved, Sun Licheng naturally understood the gravity of this danger. Coupled with the divine majesty's deep concern, he could not help but feel a sense of dread.
"Then Your Majesty, what should we do?"
Sun Licheng asked the God of Knowledge and Diplomacy nervously, completely at a loss for a solution himself.
"Heh, you truly are a harbinger of misfortune. No matter where you go, trouble is bound to follow."
Unexpectedly, the divine majesty actually chuckled.
Just as Sun Licheng was about to speak, the God of Knowledge and Diplomacy stopped him and said, "I shall bestow upon you a purification magic array capable of transforming water into holy light water. Any weapon soaked in this holy water will acquire a certain degree of purifying power, effective against the undead."
Upon hearing this, Sun Licheng was overjoyed, but immediately afterward, the God of Knowledge and Diplomacy continued, "To cope with the impending crisis, I will bestow upon you a treasure that allows you to summon the angels of my divine kingdom. However, every dispatch of angels requires a reward, and that reward consists of faith and a special kind of gemstone."
"Then how can I obtain this kind of gemstone?"
Sun Licheng hurriedly asked.
"There are certain deposits of these gemstones scattered across this continent, which can be used to forge magnificent divine artifacts. As for how precisely to acquire them, that will depend entirely upon your own efforts,"
said the divine majesty.

"What about this time?"
Sun Licheng asked. This was the crucial point. If angels were to join their ranks, surely even the greatest of crises could be safely weathered.
"This time, you need to spread my glory throughout the Sea of Sand and make the entire Sea of Sand worship me. As long as you agree to this condition, the angels dispatched for this operation will not require gemstones as payment."
The divine majesty was evidently well-prepared for Sun Licheng's question.
Sun Licheng pondered for a moment and, deciding that this demand posed no disadvantages to him, nodded in agreement.
"By the way, Your Majesty, could you bestow upon us some weapons and armor? The equipment of the sand people is truly too crude."
Just as the divine majesty was about to depart, Sun Licheng hurriedly made one final request.
"You are simply too greedy,"
the God of Knowledge and Diplomacy said with an ironic smile, tapping Sun Licheng gently on the head.
After a brief moment of thought, the divine majesty told Sun Licheng, "I know you possess the power to conjure flames; I will raise this ability of yours by one full tier. Furthermore, someone will deliver a batch of weapons to you. Ah, utilizing divine power for such matters violates the rules of the world and easily interferes with the Wheel of Fate. Let this be an exception."
"Thank you for your generosity, Your Majesty."
Sun Licheng knew this was the utmost concession the deity would make. Since the other party had even invoked the Wheel of Fate, he truly could not press for any more.
When Sun Licheng withdrew from the sea of consciousness and saw everyone staring at him, he smiled and said, "Let us hold a meeting."
During the meeting, after listening to Sun Licheng's account, everyone was dumbfounded.
An affair serious enough to warrant the caution of a deity vastly exceeded human imagination. Although the God of Knowledge and Diplomacy would dispatch angels under the guise of an employment arrangement, everyone knew this clearly indicated his profound lack of confidence in their success.
"Sun Licheng, just how terrifying must a danger be if it requires angels to combat it?"
Carolyn, being less guarded, blurted out the question directly.
What could Sun Licheng reply? He could only smile and say, "No matter what, His Majesty the God of Knowledge and Diplomacy has still provided us with immense support. Dredging the subterranean river is a matter tied to the very survival of the Sea of Sand; even without the help of the divine majesty, would we simply give up?"
"Of course we must do it! Even if it kills us, we will accomplish this task!"
Hong Sunaibu abruptly stood up and shouted.

"Very well then. Tell the soldiers that our weapons will arrive shortly. Also, tomorrow Hong Sunaibu will accompany me out to search for mineral deposits; we must rely on our own efforts as well!"
Sun Licheng clapped his hands, stood up, and issued the final command.
Once a consensus was reached, the two thousand-plus people immediately sprang into action. They began crafting more shields and soaking their weapons in the holy water produced by Sun Licheng. To Sun Licheng's delight, on the third day, a caravan of sand people delivered several hundred sets of crude weapons and leather armor, and on that very day, Sun Licheng discovered an open-air minor iron deposit.
"What is the story behind these weapons and equipment?"
Sun Licheng asked the leader of the caravan.
The caravan leader was an orc with a crocodile head. He bowed respectfully and replied, "These are the remaining military supplies traded from the goblin army by Chief Chipman. Fearing that you might have need of them here, he hired us to deliver them to you."
Upon hearing that Chipman had conceived of this idea twenty days prior, Sun Licheng marveled at how watertight the divine majesty's arrangements truly were, having planned so far in advance. At the same time, he genuinely felt the profound influence of the Wheel of Fate upon this world; even a deity of the divine realm feared suffering its backlash and could only resort to such circuitous methods to aid him.
After his flame power was upgraded, its temperature exceeded one thousand degrees, turning the flames an intense orange-red.
At this temperature, bronze melted directly into liquid, and even iron ore could be smelted into blocks of iron.
Thus, Sun Licheng began refining these crude weapons.
Watching the bronze gradually melt into liquid under the intense heat, Sun Licheng could not help but sigh with emotion: "A magical world is truly wonderful. There is simply no need to worry about the problem of furnaces."
On Earth, temperature had always been the fundamental constraint in metallurgy. Whether utilizing coke or blowers, the sole objective was to elevate the furnace temperature. Even a slight increase in temperature often brought about a monumental revolution in metal smelting.
Yet now, Sun Licheng required no fuel whatsoever; he needed only a tiny fraction of magical power and a fraction of time to produce flames steadily exceeding one thousand degrees. The smelting efficiency could only be described as heaven-defying.
To maximize efficiency, Sun Licheng was responsible solely for heating, while the sand-person artisans handled the forging, establishing a streamlined assembly-line production process. Through everyone's joint efforts, the shoddy bronze weapons within their ranks were quickly transformed into gleaming, high-quality armaments.
Naturally, these equipment supplies were insufficient to arm everyone, but fortunately, the iron ore was available.
Although the melting point of iron exceeded thirteen hundred degrees, a temperature of over a thousand degrees was still sufficient to yield wrought iron. As for the hammering and shaping, the sand people possessed robust physiques and made far superior blacksmiths than any human on Earth.
"If only my flame power could advance another step, I could directly produce pig iron."
As Sun Licheng heated the iron blocks, listening to the rhythmic *clang-clang* of the blacksmithing echoing in his ears, an even more urgent desire for his flame power to level up surged within his heart.