Ming Dynasty, New Rome, and Infinite Divine Machine

"Because I promised Mr. Shangluo to donate the money. The money is not mine. As for what happened yesterday, I just sold my shares normally. United Fruit has no right of first refusal." "I see. Tsk, what a trouble." She hung up the intercom. "Fortunately, I am always well prepared. Lolo, get up. There are some mortal affairs that need you to deal with." She patted the white lion's face.

"As for you, Mr. Shangluo, how did I suddenly realize that you and my lion have the same name? Wait here, I'll be back soon. Please don't touch my spear, don't touch it. It's a very dangerous magical item, filled with powerful phlogiston that mortals cannot withstand. If you move it, I will definitely know."

Chapter 35 Phlogiston

A golden spear stretched across the opposite seat, stretching almost the entire width of the car. The tinted glass blocked some of the light, making the Apollo's spear appear even more radiant. Like a dragon's eye opening in the darkness, the spear was its vertical pupil.

According to Phaethon, the Spear of Apollo was filled with a high concentration of phlogiston. However, the spear lay before him.

"So what exactly is phlogiston, Miss Apollonia?"

【.】

"Miss Apollonia?"

Wait, I can talk? It seems he agrees with me telling you this. Do you know why I hate Helios? Because of his arrogance. He's so arrogant he's willing to sacrifice himself, thinking he can decide what's good and what's bad like a parent. Now he's suggesting I should do it. It's so arrogant it's disgusting.

"I feel like he might cut you off again at any moment"

[Okay, then I'll take this opportunity to tell you. Phlogiston is the power of the sun, and Shen Ji is the embodiment of this power, but it can manifest in many forms - such as spiritual energy.]

"Is spiritual energy also phlogiston?"

Didn't the radish you eat grow from the ground after being exposed to the sun? Theoretically, all energy on Earth ultimately comes from the sun. For example, temperature differences in sunlight generate wind and water power, and the sun's rays allow crops to grow. Oil and coal are past solar energy stored in the earth's strata.

"Then why doesn't coal have spiritual energy?"

【Perhaps it’s because the coal is irradiated by the sun of the past.】

"Does it make any difference? Was the sun different in the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods than it is now?"

"That's a good question," Apollonia said, praisingly. "But I don't know. They're both the sun, so why is the radish a spiritual object, while oil isn't? The oil has been buried for tens of millions of years, so it's at least a legendary elixir. This question has always bothered me. I suspect it might be related to humans, since humans clearly didn't exist during the dinosaur era. If I give myself more time, I should be able to find it."

[Question and answer time ends here.] Helios' voice interrupted Apollonia's speculation. [That's all she knew, no further information.]

"You are so arrogant, just like what she said." The communication was cut off again, and Shangluo always felt that there was an unknown fire burning.

Not surprisingly, Helios didn't respond at all.

So what exactly is phlogiston?

Shangluo looked at the spear. If even Apollonia didn't know the full secrets of phlogiston, then Shangluo decided to find the answers himself. The Spear of the Apollo before him was clearly excellent learning material.

"You don't want me to touch you, right? I have a temper. If you don't want me to touch you, I will..."

"Awooo!" A lion's roar suddenly reached his ears. Shangluo turned his head and saw the white lion's massive face pressed against the car window. Its massive head filled the entire window, its entire face flat against the surface, its sandbag-sized claws still scratching at the window.

Shangluo was startled at first, but then he saw the white lion's eyes. There was no hostility in the lion's eyes, and the round pupils were moving around, as if looking for something.

"Do you want to come in?" Shangluo asked tentatively.

The white lion immediately took a step back and stopped sticking to the door, allowing Shangluo to open the door for him.

"You really understand?" He tried to open the door. As expected, the white lion named "Lolo" rushed in immediately, ignoring Shangluo's presence and heading straight for the Spear of the Sun God on the other side.

With its mouth open, gripping the spear shaft, "Lolo" slid sideways toward the car door. Lionhead struggled to maintain its balance, glancing toward the door to determine its position. Shangluo quickly stepped aside to make way for Bighead.

The white lion moved behind the door, swung its head sideways, and brought the entire Spear of the Sun God out of the car, then jumped out of the door - Shangluo only felt that the suspension of the entire car suddenly "floated" up a bit, as if the Spear of the Sun God was much heavier than it looked.

Come to think of it, Apollonia seemed a lot heavier than she looked. When she was inside the music box, it felt as heavy as a brick. It seems that objects with phlogiston are heavier than they appear.

"Is he going to shark people?"

Just now, when Phaethon got off the car, he boasted, "I will not use the Spear of Apollo on mortals, unless they have a bad temper." Shangluo was convinced that this person did seem to have a bad temper.

He leaned on the armchair and looked back through the rear window. The White Lion had just handed the spear to her, and Phaethon seemed to be discussing with someone in the back.

"United Fruit?" Shangluo remembered that these were the creditors. However, their car seemed to have a clear marking: black calligraphy on a yellow background, with the six characters "Lan Fang Tax Police Corps" written in large Chinese. Lan Fang, the controlling shareholder of United Fruit, was considered the creditor's creditor, the ultimate creditor.

Everyone who got off the bus was fully armed, and the ethnicity was incredibly mixed. There were blacks, whites, indigenous peoples from the New World, and even tattooed Maori people, but no Han Chinese. All wore steel-plate body armor, a stark contrast to the retro scale armor worn by the Jinyiwei. They carried automatic rifles, a cross between rifles and submachine guns. Instead of magazines, the rifles carried drum magazines.

Phaethon stood before them, his arms folded, blocking their way. His high ponytail fluttered in the Las Vegas wind, like the tassels on a Roman soldier's helmet. Until the white lion delivered the Spear of Apollo, Phaethon pulled the spear's handle from the lion's mouth, swung it halfway in the air, and slammed it heavily onto the ground.

Shangluo, who was in the car, only felt the ground shaking slightly, as if a cannonball exploded not far away.

Phaethon did not stop. She extended her spear toward the leading Maori, the tip of the spear pointed directly between his eyes, and stopped steadily a few inches away.

The Maori instinctively tried to block it with his hand. But the moment his hand touched the Spear of the Apollo, brilliant light burst out from the tip of the spear, as dazzling as a second sun.

"It was back then," Shangluo recalled. He'd seen that light before. When he'd swung the hammer at Apollonia, the same light had exploded. But this time, it wasn't aimed at him, but at the debt collectors. And this time, the light seemed only blinding, not knocking him to the ground like it had last time.

Several people stood there like petrified, motionless, as if their brains had been formatted.

"Hehe, I didn't do anything. You guys bumped into us." Phaethon snorted coldly, swung the Spear of Apollo and turned half a circle, then walked back towards the car with the spear in one hand.

Chapter 36 Alchemy

When I entered the door again, the car's suspension was pressed down again.

Phaethon returned to his original seat, holding the Spear of Apollo, while the white lion continued to lie down on the floor and sleep. Before closing its eyes, the white lion yawned.

"What did you do to them?"

"What, do you think I will kill them?" Phaethon asked him.

"I don't think you have any empathy with humans."

"No, no, no, Mr. Shangluo," Phaethon said with a smile. "So you're underestimating the Lan Fang Company. They pose a greater threat than even the radish fields of San Francisco. They're not particularly interested in the immortal ways of the native Aurora, but their exploration of the sun itself has reached a point where intervention is necessary. They could potentially destroy Earth within a few decades with the power of their artificial sun."

"You mean those bananas?"

"It's not just about those bananas. We can still reach some consensus with the mainland of Zhendan, but with the Lan Fang in Southeast Asia, the only way out is war. It's just that I haven't obtained permission to start a war yet."

[You are too irritable, Phaethon.] Helios' voice appeared again.

Shangluo discovered that Helios seemed to talk a lot only when it came to Phaethon. At other times, he was too lazy to even say a word.

"They were the ones who touched the spears. I didn't take the initiative to attack them." Phaethon retorted, looking into the air.

Playing with the rules comes at a price: karma. Your karma is growing heavier, and sooner or later, it will bring disaster upon you. Do what you must do, and don't do anything unnecessary, or I will retract my spear.

"Yes," Phaethon lowered his head, "I understand."

"I have other things to do. I'll leave the rest to you. Once you're done with this, meet me at Alexandria. With the union of Aurora and Rome, the great lighthouse will be completed soon. We don't have much time."

"Yes, father. I will go back as soon as possible." Phaethon stood up and saluted to the sky.

Shangluo suddenly felt the invisible pressure that had been there disappear, and even felt the car's suspension float upwards. The air began to flow, and everything felt much easier.

"Huh!" Phaethon breathed a sigh of relief. "Finally he left. You're so generous! He actually devoted an hour, two minutes, and 1 seconds of his attention to you. He didn't even pay that much attention to me."

"Haha! I'm so honored! Miss Phaethon, should I be moved to tears?"

"There's no need to shed tears. He hopes that everything will proceed as it should, like the rising and setting of the sun and moon, and the passing of the seasons, rather than the stars forming strange shapes on a single day. If one day you truly understand everything about Helios, the sun god, then it won't be too late to shed tears."

"Did he not give me something?" Shangluo suddenly remembered, "Did he say he would fulfill a wish of mine?"

"A promise of this magnitude can be fulfilled with the Spear of the Apollo, without him having to do it himself. Have you already thought of your wish?"

"Can I wish that you would return to dust immediately?"

"No," Phaethon replied, "I'm not some wish-granting machine. I have to think about it before deciding what to give you in return. And playing with the rules will only accumulate karma. Didn't you hear that?"

"Okay, Miss, you're learning now, then, can you let me make a simple wish? Like, help me with my cultivation?" Shang Luo looked at her. "Is this a good wish?"

"You want me, who opposes going against the will of heaven, to help you go against the will of heaven and cultivate? Aren't you going too far?"

"Who's really going too far now? Weren't you the ones who knocked on our door first?"

"Alright, alright." Phaethon waved his hand. "Then it's settled. I will help you with your cultivation, and I will do my best to help you. The oath cannot be broken. Even if I'm not happy about it, I have to do my best to help you. But how exactly I can help you? I need to study the alchemy method to know - Hey, is your elixir okay?"

"I don't know." Shangluo turned his head away. "I haven't eaten yet, and you guys are here."

"So, what do those pills look like? Are they the same as the legends say?"

"You'll know when you see it."

Las Vegas, underground at the Queen Hotel.

In the small office, Phaethon stared in amazement at the bronze cauldron before her. The elixir inside had cooled to a dark red ash, beneath which a moist liquid seemed to flow. There was also glowing mercury, condensed sulfur, and a host of other things she couldn't understand at all.

"Is this a pill?" The spotlight illuminated it clearly, but Phaethon still couldn't believe this was what her father wanted. She looked up into the sky—as a non-human demigod, she could also contact the divine machine. "Apollonia. Can you hear me?"

[What?] Apollonia's lazy voice came from the air. She was too lazy to pay attention to Phaethon.

"Is this really the elixir formula you calculated?"

[Tsk, if you don't believe me, then don't come and steal it. This thing is only useful if people eat it. What's the use of eating it for you?]

After receiving a cold shoulder from Apollonia, she asked Shangluo, "Is this really the elixir? I remind you, the Spear of the Apollo witnessed our agreement. If you deceive me, then my promise will not take effect."

"Hmm, Mediterranean grape juice tastes really good. Anyway, all you have to do is help me with my cultivation afterwards." Shang Luo reclined on the sofa, shaking the grape juice in his hand. He didn't bother with it because it didn't look like a pill at all. It would be great to have someone test it for him. Plus, he could get a more stable breakthrough plan, which was much more convenient.

"Don't drink anymore. You can drink as much as you want after you're done."

"Your business has nothing to do with me." Shang Luo crossed his legs. "You said that all I have to do is cooperate, and the rest is none of my business. In other words, as long as I cooperate, whether you succeed or not is none of my business. Also, before you start, where is the person I want to see? I won't agree if I can't see him."

Phaethon winked at the door, and a Greek man in a suit walked out. Not long after, he brought Wen Yuan in.

"Come on, have a drink." Shangluo took the bottle and served him a drink.

"Um, I'm sorry, I can't drink. Drinking is harmful to the body and will reduce your cultivation." Wen Yuan declined, but then took another look at the label. "Ah, it's grape juice. Come on, let me have some too."

He approached Shangluo and said in a low voice, "I know everything—I can't thank you enough for your kindness. If you had just left me and walked away, I'd never have been able to return."

"Let's not talk about that for now. What about the elixir formula?" Shang Luo asked as he turned it over to him. "If they analyze the elixir, will it be detrimental to the court?"

"No, just study it casually, and let them come." Wen Yuan said with a half-smile, "With their skills, they still think they can break the Daozu's method. They are dreaming. If they can really crack the secrets laid by the Daozu, I would like them to share a piece of the pie. The court will really thank their whole family."

Chapter 37 Experiment

"Before we start the experiment, I have a question." Wen Yuan, who was sitting on the sofa, raised his hand.

Phaethon leaned lightly on the table, feeling a little irritated by the unknown future. "Let me make this clear first. You are not qualified to negotiate with me now. I will only talk to him."

"I only have one small request—considering the possibility that I might suffer irreversible consequences, including death, after this experiment. I request a final meal."

Phaethon thought for a moment, "Okay. This is the most basic humanistic concern. I can promise you that."

She picked up a red phone on the table: "What do you want to eat?"

"I want McDonald's, 15 chicken nuggets with two packets of Sichuan spicy sauce and two packets of sweet and sour sauce; preserved egg and lean meat congee with ice; a 1:1:1 mix of cola, black tea, and grape juice, with a little ice. I also want a double chicken burger, no lettuce, no salad dressing, four slices of tomato, and a whole-wheat tortilla."

Phaethon said into the microphone, "Order him a McDonald's. 15 chicken nuggets, two packets of Sichuan spicy sauce and two packets of sweet and sour sauce; a bowl of preserved egg and lean meat porridge with ice; a glass of cola, black tea, and grape juice mixed in a 1:1:1 ratio, with a little ice. And a double chicken burger, no lettuce, no salad dressing, four slices of tomato, and a whole-wheat tortilla."

Phaethon repeated his request word for word and then asked him, "Anything else?"

"Thank you. No thanks."

"That's it," Phaethon said, hanging up the phone. "I know what you want to do. Is this some kind of code? The Golden Arches in Las Vegas is your intelligence station? A good strategy. You've made a request I can't refuse, because no matter what, I will fulfill your request for a final meal."

"Why?" Wen Yuan asked her.

"I'm not obligated to answer you, but it's okay to tell you—because of karma, I must fulfill your final request before you die. It's the most basic of humane considerations, a naturally established 'vow.' At the same time, my boy, you've also created karma with your final meal. Now, I'm afraid you must die."

"I do not think so."

"Really? Then we'll wait and see." After saying that, she looked at Shangluo, "I've already met his final request. I've fulfilled all the obligations of a 'law enforcer.' Now, it's your turn to enforce our agreement—how should this pill be taken?"

"I don't know." Shangluo spread his hands, "I really don't know."

Phaethon swung his spear with one hand, the heavy lance making a faint sound as it cut through the wind. It rested steadily before Shangluo's eyes. "You made a vow. You promised to analyze this 'elixir' for us and provide whatever assistance you can. If you have a clear conscience, hold it. I need to know if you are lying."

"Can this thing read minds?"

"The Spear of the Apollo is the witness and executor of the oath. Swearing an oath upon it is equivalent to swearing an oath upon the Great Styx. Therefore, it can read the parts related to the oath. Hold it, and I will know whether you have violated the oath—but don't worry, the process is encrypted. I won't know the specific content, only whether you have violated the agreement."

She held the end of the spear in one hand, the tip extending several meters away and resting in front of Shangluo, motionless. Shangluo reached out and grasped the tip, which remained as firm as if it were fixed in space.

To his surprise, the seemingly sharp spear tip didn't cut his finger. He even felt an inexplicable sound coming from his fingertips—the quiet sound of the tide, one wave after another, rustling against the shore.

"Alright." Phaethon pulled the spear back from his hand. "You really don't know why Father chose your potion. You don't even know what you're doing. Apollonia, let me confirm this again. You don't know either."

“I don’t know.” Apollonia replied.

"Well, it seems I can only activate the backup plan."

She picked up the red phone: "Send in the volunteers."