Arknights' Lock of Heaven

The great nobles desired war to deplete the excess population in their territories, plunder wealth, and alleviate domestic conflicts.

If the Chernobog incident failed, then turning our attention to the interior of Ursus is not out of the question.

As for the consequences of war, who cares?

Oh, the infected care, but who treats them like human beings?

Those minor nobles living near the snowfields were worried about what would happen if a war broke out and they lost their own territories.

But is it useful for them to care?

It's no use. No one will listen to the former's voice, and as for the latter... those great nobles don't mind their territories expanding a little more on the map.

Yes, even those nobles were only superficially united.

Those far away are ambitious, while those nearby are worried. The nobles have already taken their seats at the table, knives and forks in hand, ready to feast.

They didn't care whether the food they ate came from infected people or from noble families.

The winner takes all, and they have always been the winners throughout history.

So they weren't worried at all.

From its very inception, Ursus was destined to be nothing more than a ravenous war beast, and there was no way to change that.

More than ten Uca wars, invasion of Sami, covert rivalry with Colombia, covetous eyes on Letania, and competition for supremacy with Vitória...

Like a speeding carriage, it either breaks through all obstacles or crashes to its death.

No one can stop it unless the entire country is rebuilt from the ground up.

The doctor knew it all too well.

Patriots are now in a precarious situation, like being boiled in oil on a hot plate; one wrong step and they will lose everything.

Emperor Ursus could no longer sit idly by; he could not stand by and watch as the nobles forced him into war.

In the end, all the benefits will go to those nobles, while we will suffer heavy losses and get nothing. Even the reputation we have built up over the years to improve the treatment of infected people will be lost.

This is something he absolutely cannot accept.

The nobles are waiting, waiting for the patriots to be unable to feed the ever-growing number of hungry infected, waiting for them to pour out in droves.

The emperor could only place his bets on Rhodes Island. If a stable trade route could be established from Kazimierz to the eastern snowfields of Ursus, everything would be different.

It can not only bring vitality to itself, but also promote the development of cities along the way.

It should be noted that these places were basically the emperor's direct territories.

If he succeeds, he'll win big!

He was initially worried about Rhodes Island's capabilities and whether they could break through the encirclement and suppression.

But ever since the top-secret intelligence from Kazimir was sent back, he stopped worrying about it.

341 John's Mom

In the end, the doctor, filled with sorrow, boarded the near-ground aircraft with Amiya.

Before leaving, she looked longingly at the night sky over Siesta, as if mourning her lost vacation.

"That was really close," Tianhuo patted his chest and looked at Xia Yu sitting by the window.

"The temperature in Siesta is so abnormal. It's already the height of summer, and in previous years the number of tourists would have decreased by now, but for some reason the temperature has remained within a fixed range for the past few days..."

As he said this, his eyes couldn't help but dart towards Xia Yu. "Many experts are going crazy when they see this. One abnormal thing after another is happening."

"First, the volcano's anomalies made people want to dig it open to find out what was going on. Everyone thought it was caused by the super-giant mutant Pompeii."

Hearing this, Eyjafjalla understood the implication and coughed lightly, blushing as she said, "That's right, even if biologists repeatedly state that it couldn't have caused this, it doesn't have that ability."

"But there are still people who don't believe it."

"In addition, the recent revelation about the strangely constant temperature within a certain range has kept the academic community in a heated debate."

As they said this, their eyes glanced towards the windowsill.

"Why is that?" X2

Hearing this, Xia Yu shook her head.

“It’s no trouble telling you,” he said, puffing out his chest at the two men who were singing in unison, “I did it!”

"The problem is, how exactly did you manage to do this?!" Tianhuo took a deep breath upon hearing this. "Since you wanted us to join your so-called caravan project team, what kind of lousy name is that?"

"By the way, if you join the project team, you can at least share the specific experimental details, right?"

"We're going tomorrow! We'll probably start the project in a couple of days after we get back!"

"As a result, we still know nothing about the specific details of the project..." Tianhuo complained. "Even if it's really important, you should at least give us a no-comments answer, right?"

"Ahem," Xia Yu coughed lightly, clearing her throat, "First of all, let me clarify, the name 'caravan'... is not my fault..."

"If you don't like what I said, go talk to the Doctor. I applied through her, and she reported it to Rhodes Island. If you have any objections, go talk to her!"

"Secondly, there's really nothing about the project itself that can't be revealed," Xia Yu said, shrugging. "After all, you'll need to oversee the details."

"Besides, it's not that I don't want to tell you, but I feel I've already revealed enough information... You should be able to guess..."

"Temperature, environmental control, and our destination."

“Senior, it’s precisely because we had a hunch that we were so…impatient,” Eyjafjalla said with a wry smile. “After all, this kind of thing…was something we only ever saw in science fiction novels before.”

“Besides, we’re not like you and the Doctor,” Tianhu rolled his eyes at Xia Yu, “we can tell what the other is thinking just by looking at each other. We don’t have that kind of chemistry with you!”

"You'd better just say it directly."

"Well," Xia Yu touched her nose, "basically, it's what you all think."

"Of course, it won't be a large-scale event. It will only be held in a small area to test the waters first, and then we'll gradually adjust our technical shortcomings, taking it one step at a time."

“That’s already amazing,” Skyfire sighed upon hearing this. “I even doubt whether you’re really an Agor, and a pure-blooded one who came up from the sea with their technology.”

"After all, it's estimated that only the legendary underwater city of Agor and the underground cities of the Durin people possess such technology on the continent of Terra now."

"Legend has it that the technological development of these two races is very different from ours. The Iberians benefited greatly from the technological advancements of the Agors during their golden age, which is consistent with the fact that we simply cannot understand how they did it..."

Hearing this, Skadi, who had been silently wiping her sword, looked up at Skyfire and then at Xia Yu.

Yeah, he's a damn Agorian, Dulin... well, those short guys are even less likely to be...

The Agorians aren't that exaggerated. If they could do what he did, would they need to be beaten by Haisi?

After painstakingly using all my resources and years of accumulated deep-sea hunters to stage a last-ditch comeback against the sea god, you're telling me there are multiple sea gods in the ocean...

There are even people of the same race as the sea god in this Siesta...

If it weren't for the fact that Xia Yu could control those ghostly things, Skadi would probably have given up on treatment and just waited to die, beyond saving.

Now you're telling me he's an Ager who has mastered Ager's core technology... whatever makes you happy.

Skadi glanced at Xia Yu and shook her head silently.

"Think what you want," Xia Yu shrugged as she read this. "Agor or Dulin, it's all the same."

Instead of racking your brains trying to guess this, you should focus on making plans for your journey to the snowfield.

"Rome wasn't built in a day, and neither can we achieve anything overnight in the snowy plains. We'll have to go through a tough period."

"I hope you can get used to it."

“Don’t worry about that,” Eyjafjalla winked at Xia Yu, “Senior, the environment was also quite harsh when I went out to investigate the volcano.”

Hearing this, Xia Yu nodded. As everyone knows, Eyjafjalla contracted Oripathy while conducting research at a volcano. After getting the disease, she didn't take care of her health, which is why her condition worsened.

After confirming that Eyjafjalla was alright, everyone turned their attention to Skyfire.

This is a genuine young lady from Victoria's Reign of Kings.

"Why are you all staring at me?" Seeing this, she clenched her fist fiercely. "Huh? Do you all think I'm that spoiled?"

"As an expert in Originium geology, I'm quite used to living in the wild, okay!"

"Okay, okay," Xia Yu shrugged upon hearing this. "It was my fault. I underestimated you all."

"That's all for tonight. Get some rest. We still have a long flight to take tomorrow back to Rhodes Island."

-

"PhD!!!"

The next day, early in the morning.

Just after arriving at the hidden safe house on the outskirts of Ticalendo, Huang grabbed the Doctor and cried out, "You've finally come!"

With the PhD here, we have a pillar of support!

"Alright, alright," the Doctor said with a look of disgust, pushing away Huang's enthusiastic face. She had already become familiar with this enthusiastic big cat.

"What exactly happened? Although I've already read the information, I still want to hear your firsthand intelligence."

"Oh, is that so..." Huang reluctantly let go of the Doctor after hearing this, then turned around and hugged Amiya in his arms, ignoring her protests as he rubbed her face and told her about their experiences.

“…That’s how it is. We were attacked out of nowhere,” Huang said regretfully, letting go of Amiya who was staring at her with her puffed-up cheeks. “Our initial assessment is that it was our partner, Aunt John, who was behind it.”

"Of course, since the intelligence sources are those who were sent to deal with us, it cannot be ruled out that someone is deliberately misleading us, but the possibility is very small."