Chapter Ninety: Reinforced Rail Line

The night was hazy, and dawn was just beginning to stir.

Qin Le was still half-asleep, his nose twitching faintly as a very pleasant fragrance slipped into it.

His consciousness gradually cleared, his pupils finding focus, and into view came strands of green hair.

“This is...”

He tilted his head slightly and saw a face of beauty not meant for this world, resting upon his arm.

Skin like jade, smooth as snow, so lovely it was almost suffocating.

He had to admit that this elven girl, with three digits to her age, was extraordinarily beautiful—like the unattainable beauty from his former life, forever trapped behind a screen.

“Mmm... Red gold... all of it is mine...” Elmya wore a somewhat foolish smile.

“She can talk. What a pity.” A trace of regret appeared on Qin Le’s face.

Elmya was wonderful in every way—light of frame, soft of touch, long-legged, slender-waisted, and beautiful besides. If only she could not speak, she would be a perfect girlfriend.

Then Qin Le’s expression slowly stiffened. As sensation returned to his arm, he felt something damp.

Elmya had actually been drooling, and judging by the dampness beneath the sheet, the saliva might have been on his arm all night.

At that thought, Qin Le’s face darkened instantly. He snatched his arm back so quickly it was as if he had been burned.

Bang!

Elmya, who had fallen asleep slumped beside the bed, lost her pillow at once, and her forehead struck the stainless-steel bed frame.

“Ow! Who—?!”

The sudden pain jolted the mischievous elf awake. She gave a sharp cry, then her legs went weak and she rolled straight under the bed.

A few seconds later, a green head cautiously emerged from beneath it, peering left and right like a little mouse before slowly crawling out once she had confirmed there was no danger.

Qin Le watched the scene expressionlessly, using the sheet to wipe the saliva from his arm. Even now, he could still faintly smell it.

He had actually felt his heart skip for this little troublemaking elf. What a sin.

A person should not—at the very least, should not have—

Recovering from the fright, Elmya turned and saw Qin Le on the bed. Her morning temper flared at once; she glared at him with bright eyes and said in a fierce, babyish voice, “Qin Le! Do you know how terrifying it is to disturb the future Great Sage’s sweet dream?!”

“Do you know how disgusting it is to drool all over someone else?” Qin Le shot back.

Even his own drool was revolting enough. Someone else’s on his body made his skin crawl.

“Whose fault was that, then? You’re like some greedy thing possessed by appetite—no matter what, you can never be satisfied!” Elmya stomped her slender feet in frustration.

“Every night I have to help you push it to the limit. Something that would take other people ten minutes takes you five hours and still isn’t done! And you? You just close your eyes and go right to sleep, while I’m the one left exhausted like a dog!”

“I’m done. No matter how much you pay, I’m not doing it anymore!”

For the past ten days, Elmya had been using Moon-Eating Art to help Qin Le advance into the transcendent realm. At first, after several attempts, she found that Qin Le required a vast amount of spiritual essence. To save time, she had simply loosened her restraint and increased the influx of lunar power—but she never expected that this experiment would leave her in such a miserable state.

No matter how much moonlight she guided in, Qin Le could take it all, like a bottomless abyss. What made her most furious was that he had grown used to it and would simply fall into deep sleep.

The amount of spiritual essence this man needed to advance was absurdly large—more than a dragon from the legends, perhaps even more.

Elmya feared that even if she drained herself completely, she still might not be able to help him advance.

This was a losing deal.

Hearing this, Qin Le said with some apology, “That was careless of me. From now on, let’s shorten it to three hours.”

These days Elmya really had spent a tremendous amount of effort helping him advance. Every time it ended, she had to brace herself against the wall on the way out, and more recently she had simply fallen asleep here.

Even a farm donkey gets to rest. Qin Le could hardly keep pressing her so hard.

Indeed, this had been his oversight—he had not considered how much it cost her.

Elmya pointed out the window and said angrily, “I, Elmya, keep my word and never go back on it! Even if I jumped from here and smashed my head to pieces, I still wouldn’t help you again!”

Seeing this, Qin Le sighed. It looked like he would have to rely on his money power again.

“I’ll pay you one more red-gold coin per hour from now on.”

“Hmph!” Elmya folded her arms and turned her head away, her attitude utterly resolute. “I’m not that kind of person. I, Elmya, keep my word.”

Qin Le said with obvious regret, “If Miss Elmya is so determined, I won’t press the matter. I was just about to raise it to three red-gold coins per hour.”

The words had barely fallen before that fresh, natural fragrance rushed up to him.

Elmya suddenly appeared at the bedside, seized Qin Le’s hand, and with sincerity shining on her delicate features, said firmly, “Qin Le, what kind of relationship do we have? How could we possibly quarrel over something so small? To help you reach the transcendent realm, I’d even stake my life if I had to!”

“Miss Elmya, who was it just now saying that even if she jumped from here and smashed her head to pieces, she still wouldn’t help me?” Qin Le said, amused and exasperated at once.

“Since we’re so close, could you make it cheaper?”

“Then let’s not talk about our relationship. It hurts the wallet,” Elmya said without hesitation.

After bickering with the mischievous elf for a while, Qin Le was fully awake and began sensing the qi within his body.

Through ten days of effort, the qi in his lower half had already been thoroughly opened. It had now reached his neck, and in another ten-odd days it should arrive at his head. Without Elmya’s help, even if he treated Spirit Awakening Pills like meals and ate thousands or even tens of thousands a day, it would still take him a year, perhaps two, to become a first-rank transcendent.

The path of transcendence was indeed just as the book had said: some people were born to run, some could only walk, some could only crawl, and more still could not even walk at all. As for himself, he was somewhere between crawling and not being able to walk, and Elmya was the one carrying him on her back.

He only hoped that once he became first rank, the passage would expand, or at the very least last a little longer.

At present, the nation’s transport capacity did not seem short, but in the future it would be badly insufficient, perhaps even causing chaos.

According to the think tank’s rough estimate, the refugees pouring toward them now numbered far more than one or two hundred thousand. Even though the eastern territories had a relatively small population, with such a massive influx there would be at least five hundred thousand, perhaps even more.

Feeding half a million people without straining all available transport capacity would be easy enough, but it would affect the nation’s development. Yet under such circumstances, the nation could not refuse. It had to accept these refugees.

For the nation needed this matter to shape its reputation, to tell the millions of people across the eastern territories that the nation could feed and clothe them, that obeying it would certainly not be wrong.

At the same time, Qin Le harbored his own selfish motive. He wanted the nation to develop faster and grow stronger in this world. Only then could it help him obtain more transcendent resources, allowing him to keep moving forward.

That feeling of growing stronger in this way fascinated him deeply. The joy that rose from the heart, along with the sense of steadiness he had never known since crossing into this world, drove him ever onward in his pursuit of transcendence.

In the dining hall, only Qin Le and Elmya were eating breakfast.

Because they had gotten up rather late, breakfast time had already passed, and everyone else had gone off to attend to their own affairs.

Including his personal guard, the spearhead unit had already boarded drones and set out into the wilderness to hunt monsters, beginning their path of assassination.

Olinea was, under the think tank’s arrangement, learning how to become a qualified administrator.

Elmya gulped down a bowl of porridge, wiped her mouth, and saw Qin Le once again reading those strange papers. She could not help but complain, “You’re way too hardworking. You don’t look like a ruler at all.”

“Be in a position, do the work of that position, and fulfill the responsibilities that come with it,” Qin Le replied offhandedly.

“Your head is full of nothing but the nation, the nation, the nation. How boring. You might as well devote yourself to the nation like those believers,” Elmya said with open disdain.

Clearly, the elf girl hated the idea of sacrificing oneself for the collective. Perhaps she was also influenced by the inertia of this world. Setting that aside, she was still a kind person. When they had faced a spiritual assault, she had saved everyone, and at the very least she was not stingy when it came to what she was able to do.

Qin Le set down the documents and explained, “Elmya, the nation has never belonged to any one person or any one group. It belongs to everyone within it. I am one of them too. The stronger the nation becomes, the more beneficial it is to me.”

“One person’s strength is limited, but the strength of the collective is infinite. Borrowing the power of the whole, I can accomplish miracles that no individual could ever achieve.”

At that moment, a knock came from the rear door. A soldier in uniform walked in and gave a proper salute.

“Report: the first stage of the heavy rail system has been completed.”

Qin Le smiled slightly and said, “Come with me. I’ll show you the power of the collective—a power that can truly be called miraculous.”