Monsters Die When Killed

But soon, Su Zhou realized the limitations of this line of thinking.

A civilization that adopted such a method could certainly maintain complete stability and cohesion, but it would also, in a way, lock away its own potential. Only by oscillating between good and evil could it create greater ripples.

The same was true for cultivation. Forcing someone to be good, even with the best intentions, was a twisted form of modification that would only aggravate their Heart Demons, making it extremely difficult for them to advance further.

Just then, Su Zhou recalled what Yara had said to him in the Reincarnation World.

’To eliminate the possibility of evil... is to obstruct the freedom of others to commit evil.’

He once wondered why committing evil was worthy of the word "freedom." But now, as he considered it from a different perspective, he naturally came to a realization. Just like forcing people to only commit evil, compelling others to only be good was, in itself, seemingly ’a form of evil’—an evil that would cause humanity to stagnate.

Good must be accepted, and so must evil.

Humanity must be possessed, and so must bestiality.

A healthy civilization could never hold to just one side.

Only then could it endure.

"When are the Harmony Bureau’s troops and the American Federation’s reinforcements going to get here?"

Done with that line of thought, Su Zhou let out a breath and asked impatiently, "I’ve already been waiting for over forty minutes. Don’t tell me I have to keep waiting?"

’Forty minutes? Don’t you know the official start date for this joint operation isn’t for another half a week?’

At that moment, Gelang truly didn’t know how to respond. Mobilizing Transcendents from all over the world wasn’t a quick affair. Just resetting defenses, having a Transcendent apply to leave their country, and having the destination country accept and process the paperwork—it was perfectly normal for all that to take a few days.

This Su Zhou had special privileges. He’d had a green light all the way from the Zhengguo Dao to Europe, arriving at the Two Realms Fortress in just under half a day. Other Transcendents didn’t have that!

However, just as Gelang was hesitating, unsure how to explain the situation to Su Zhou, for better or for worse, a sudden emergency alert broke the awkward stalemate.

[UNIDENTIFIED HIGH-SPEED OBJECT DETECTED, ADVANCING TOWARD THE FORMER FORTRESS RUINS.]

A tense alarm blared from the terminal: [HIGH PROBABILITY OF HOSTILES FROM THE SPIRIT SUMMONING ASSOCIATION... DAMN IT, THEIR EXOSKELETON ARMOR HAS STEALTH MODULES. WE’VE LOST VISUAL!]

"Wh-What?!"

For a moment, Gelang hadn’t yet processed what was happening. It was Rafael who frowned deeply. "They actually dare to launch a surprise attack on us?!"

"Do they really think the Harmony Bureau is a pushover?!"

Despite his tough talk, the Harmony Bureau’s forces here at the Two Realms Fortress really were a pushover at the moment. Ever since the fortress had been breached, they had avoided trying to repair the fortifications in the Demon Realm to prevent secondary damage from Magical Beast attacks while they were still gathering their forces.

They could guarantee that the Spirit Summoning Association couldn’t escape the Demon Realm, but their current forces within the Demon Realm were insufficient to withstand an attack from them. That was precisely why they needed to summon powerful Transcendents from all over.

"We should temporarily retreat."

Rafael suggested. The old man saw nothing wrong with it; it was a common tactic. "We’re outnumbered right now. There’s no need for a head-on confrontation. Once our main force arrives and pushes forward, they won’t be able to defeat us in a direct fight."

It was indeed an excellent suggestion.

But Su Zhou shook his head.

"I’m not an obsessive person, but I do make it a point to keep my word."

The young man stood his ground and shrugged. "Since I said it before, I’m going to do it."

"—I’m staying right here. I’m not going anywhere."

Never mind the anxious Steward Gelang, who looked like he was about to tear his hair out, or Rafael, who had expected this answer all along, or even Selos, whose eyes lit up as he continued to jot down ’Selected Quotes of Su Zhou’ in his notebook.

At that very moment, the Spirit Summoning Association’s forces also discovered the presence of the Harmony Bureau.

"Hold on."

Piloting his custom Exoskeleton Armor, the Reborn signaled everyone to halt. He frowned, activated his long-range observation mode, and then exclaimed in utter astonishment, "Why is the ’Thunder Lord’ here?!"

"So it was him who acted just now. No wonder I didn’t know the Harmony Bureau had a Thunder Ability User of this level—even the Cultivators of the Thunder God’s lineage in Northern Europe focus on close-quarters combat."

Thunder Lord was the title Su Zhou was known by, just like Rafael’s ’Rest’. As the saying goes, ’there are wrongly given names, but never wrongly given titles.’ Su Zhou was indeed the world’s number one Thunder Power User. For the major Mysterious Organizations, in particular, his first claim to fame was slaying the Leader of the Spirit Summoning Association, the Reborn’s friend, Shepherd of Spirits Vashir Hart.

Seeing Su Zhou, old grudges and new hatreds surged within the Reborn. They knew that Su Zhou had once fought and defeated four Divine Beasts that had temporarily broken through to the Commander Tier in the Beast God Realm, but none of them cared.

For one, the Silent possessed similar strength. And as for them, who had personally heard the Tianqi of the Celestial Gods, which one of them wasn’t stronger than those Divine Beasts? Even if Su Zhou’s power had grown, defeating them would be no easy task.

And just as the Reborn began to observe Su Zhou, Su Zhou also detected the distant Spirit Summoning Association strike force.

It was an elite, high-tech unit the likes of which even he had only ever seen in Zhengguo’s ’Five Directions Divine Soldiers’ force. A total of twenty-three large, fully-enclosed Exoskeleton Armors pulsed with Spiritual Light. Materialized Spiritual Power cycled through their ’Spiritual Energy Vortex Engines,’ infusing the entire armor with unparalleled violence and Defense Power. The dense arrays of Military Equipment and rocket pods gave off an overwhelming sense of danger.