Chapter 78: Chapter 78, Lay Down Your Arms, Don’t Be a Traitor.
Killing Mondok in his current state was as easy for Gu Hang as snuffing out a chick. His spiritual energy could lift Mondok’s entire body into the air; the same force could easily break Mondok’s neck without any problem.
Gu Hang did not do so; instead, he chose to shoot Mondok, and the reason for an execution by gunfire was the sense of formality.
Gu Hang wanted to use this symbolically significant method of execution by firing squad to tell all the soldiers that their former commander was a criminal, a traitor to the Empire. And they should, at this moment, completely disassociate themselves from the traitor and accept the leadership of the Governor.
He also did not plan to immediately put to use all of these ten thousand soldiers of Revival City. But at the very least, these men definitely could not become an obstacle to his next actions.
If a great purge was inevitable, it would start first within the army.
The surrounding soldiers almost all saw what happened in the sky and heard the Governor’s declaration.
The General, a traitor?
This news was somewhat difficult to accept all at once.
It wasn’t as if the soldiers would really consider Mondok a traitor and Gu Hang their commander just because Gu Hang said so. After all, they were not very familiar with Gu Hang before this, whereas Mondok had been their leader for many years. Many among them were officers promoted by General Mondok.
However, Mondok was now dead.
He died right before their eyes, executed as a convicted criminal.
The object of their loyalty had been lost.
Many were left in a state of confusion.
What was to come next?
To avenge the General?
This…
For some who were deeply indebted to Mondok, this was indeed an option. In fact, some had already tried to do so.
An officer attempted to continue rallying his soldiers to launch an attack.
But this was not particularly effective.
The most crucial point was that they had no way of denying Gu Hang’s status as a ruler. He was the genuine Governor, and he had executed the General, leaving the surviving soldiers with almost no reason to continue fighting. Merely incited by officers, the efforts were not so potent. Only a few who were muddled in their minds would draw their weapons and attempt an attack.
Facing these attacks, Gu Hang remained unmoved in the air.
This was not the time to back down. He had to stand here, repeatedly broadcast the declaration he had just made to the soldiers, and imprint his identity deeply into the soldiers’ minds.
As for those who were stubbornly deluded, their attacks were within the range that Gu Hang could handle. His telekinetic control was enough for him to catch the bullets aimed at him from a certain distance, and deflect them away from hitting the target. And even if there were a few bullets that he could not capture in time, he still had spiritual energy as a last resort to protect himself.
If faced with a barrage from ten thousand people, no doubt, Gu Hang would have to flee instantly; but that situation did not occur, and the ones who attacked him were only a minority in the end.
This small number of hard-liners was soon suppressed powerfully.
The star warriors would take action.
The bomb guns in Phoenix’s hands were always precise in eliminating the rebels.
However, the cultists Gu Hang was worried about posed no threat to him.
His previous speculation had been correct; within the Revival City army, there surely were sorcerers from the Primordial Wrath Owl Sect hiding. After he took to the sky, these sorcerers quietly emerged and targeted him.
Within the range of Gu Hang’s psionic perception, he had already detected the traces of these heretic cultists.
Aside from planning to attack Gu Hang with their spiritual energy, they were also trying to incite the soldiers around them to continue their assault on Gu Hang.
Yet, trusting in the battle nuns, Gu Hang did not move.
And the sisters, led by Superior Georgette, indeed did not betray Gu Hang’s trust.
In the previous action, the Sancta Liliums, who had seemed somewhat slack, now became proactive. Eleven of them, without the need for communication, neatly paired up into teams of two, with Georgette acting alone. In total, six groups rushed into the crowd of soldiers.
Shouting in the name of The Emperor, they rooted out the cultists who had revealed themselves and were ready to attempt using forbidden magic to attack Gu Hang.
They were true experts in combating heretics, the nemesis of all that is heretical, cultist, and spiritually powered.
A faint glow arose from the Sancta Liliums, the Divine Emperor’s blessing had arrived. Within a certain range, all hostile spiritual energy and malevolent methods were directly hindered.
Of course, this obstruction was not absolute. If the target was too powerful, the evil magic that should be cast would still work. After all, their anti-psionic strength came from the divine magic they wielded, from the blessings of The Emperor. Essentially, when any hostile spell took effect, their divine power would immediately counteract it.
However, at least the sorcerers present could not break through the suppression of the battle nuns’ anti-psionic power.
With their magic and psychic abilities ineffective, those cultists mixed among the soldiers had no ability to fight back and were easily eradicated.
Seeing the battle nuns kill their ‘comrades’ nearby, some soldiers began to resist. Whether their counterattack was instinctual or they were truly bewitched by the cultists, the Sancta Liliums showed no mercy and eliminated all resistance.
The cultists infiltrated among them looked no different in appearance and attire from ordinary soldiers. The soldiers did not know that these were cultists, with some thinking they were being slaughtered.
To prevent the spread of such a misunderstanding and avoid the already tense situation sliding into total chaos, Gu Hang used his spiritual energy to amplify his voice and again spoke next to the ears of all the soldiers:
“Lay down your weapons! Cease resistance! Cultists intending to destroy Revival City are plotting action, and the battle nuns are purging the heretics. Lay down your weapons! You will not be implicated! Anyone continuing to hold weapons will be regarded as traitors!”
“Lay down your weapons! Do not become traitors!”
In confusion, a considerable number of soldiers finally stopped resisting.
And at this moment, Yan Fangxu’s infantry brigade also appeared on the scene.
They cautiously approached the Alliance Legion’s defensive line, also shouting along with the governor to lay down weapons and stop resisting.
The disarmed soldiers stayed in place peacefully; those few still holding weapons, whether they resisted or not, were all executed.
As a human loudspeaker in the air, plus casting a ‘persuasion to surrender aura’ over the entire Alliance Army; star warriors and battle nuns inside rooting out stubborn traitors, confiscating ordinary soldiers’ weapons; Yan Fangxu leading the infantry brigade began disarming from the outside…
The main battle thus ended; most Alliance soldiers, after witnessing the execution of General Mondok by firing squad, the governor’s personal orders to surrender, and facing the overwhelming star warriors and battle nuns, chose to surrender.
They did not want to fight any longer.
Unable to win and unclear about the meaning behind continuing the fight, why keep fighting?