It was as if a tide of sacrificial spirit was sweeping across the Black Star Army players.

As the Character Summon Card was proved to be real, the forums temporarily became the intelligence center of Operation Saving Black Star. Many army players gathered in groups and expanded their teams here, making posts under Fly Free’s Operation Command Center.

Many senior players who had played since Version 1.0 had a sense of responsibility and faith; they felt they had to do something to solve the crisis of the army falling into the hands of the Mechanic Emperor. Crowds gathered, and even some professional players such as Frenzied Sword and Maple Moon took part. Operation Saving Black Star had become a large event held by the army players themselves.

Of course, there were also those with other motives among the participants. Some just wanted to make the news bigger, some wanted to show their loyalty so Black Star would notice them after ‘returning’, and some wanted to try to trigger hidden missions. The atmosphere on the forums was like a war was going on. Everyone thought they were making a difference. However, the majority were just rubbernecking and adding spices. There were not only Chinese players in the army anymore. There were also a ton of international players who joined only in Version 4.0. Most of them were just watching with excitement.

Even among the Chinese players, there were also some who did not think it was worth risking the time and effort they had spent in the Black Star Army and did not take part.

Everything happening on the forums over the past three days was witnessed by Han Xiao. Operation Saving Black Star had absolutely no secrets to him.

Although these players were planning on how to backstab him the next day, not only did Han Xiao feel angry about it, but he even found it interesting

At this time, Phillip popped out and said, “Master, hum… There are a few Immortals who want to see you. They said they have found out that the Immortals are planning a mutiny, so they want to report it to you.”

“Oh?” Han Xiao’s eyes sparkled.

Traitors?

Hmm, come to think of it, since they’re players, it’d be weird to not have traitors.

“Tell them to come here,” Han Xiao ordered.

After staying for a while in the office, a few players in flashy armor came in. They were clearly foreign players judging from their IDs. “Yo, army commander.” An Ice Demon Race player who seemed like their leader greeted Han Xiao in a very hip-pop style.

Han Xiao acted like he had no idea. He looked confused and asked, “You said that the Immortals are planning on a mutiny? Tell me, what is this about?”

“Yo, here’s what it is. We’re all good people, but some Immortals are ambitious people. They’re not happy with your ruling now, so they plan to use a ridiculous excuse to incite the army. Wow. At tomorrow’s award ceremony, they’ll attack you definitely.” Han Xiao rose his brows. “What excuse?”

“From what I heard, they said you’re the Mechanic Emperor in disguise. Ain’t that funny? Hahaha.”

“Interesting.” Han Xiao sized him up, smiled, and said, “Got it, I’ll investigate the matter. If it’s true, you’ll all be given rewards.”

“Hehe, I’d like more Contribution Points.” This person was very straight forward.

Han Xiao acted as if he did not hear them. He waved and told them to leave. This time, Phillip reported again, saying there were more people who wanted to see him.

He did not reject any of them and patiently spoke to one group of traitors after another. Most of them were foreign players, and what they said was mostly the same, exposing Fly Free and the others’ plan and twisting their motive, claiming the motive of the mutiny was ambition. After sending off the last group of them, Han Xiao smiled.

“Some of these are pure opportunists, but the rest are probably the spies the foreign professional guilds have placed inside the army. Hehe, they’re trying to cause more problems.”

He had always known that there were spies of foreign guilds in the army, and this was unavoidable. The motive behind Fly Free and the other senior players’ actions was positive, but these spies definitely did not have positive motives.

Han Xiao knew instantly that these spies were trying to make the situation worse. On one hand, they wanted the Chinese players to be heavily punished, so the Chinese guilds would be affected too. On the other hand, they also wanted to reduce his trust in the Immortals so that the army players would receive fewer benefits.

Clearly, the foreign players did not care if he was really the Mechanic Emperor or Black Star. If he was the Mechanic Emperor, he would be alarmed, discover the mutiny in advance, and take action. If this was all a misunderstanding and he was still Black Star, reporting the mutiny to him would also be an act of loyalty. They thought they were killing two birds with one stone.

Without the forums, Han Xiao might have fallen for it. However, Han Xiao already knew everything about this through the forums, so he easily saw through these spies’ plan to use him.

Looking at these traitors’ satisfied expressions thinking their plan had worked, Han Xiao looked normal but was laughing inside.

I’ll let you guys laugh for a while and deal with you after the ceremony.

Han Xiao tapped the table and ordered, “Phillip, secretly dispatch the mechanical soldiers in the warehouse and put them around the venue, especially the VIP area, audience seats, and the news stand. The moment anyone attacks the guests tomorrow, arrest them immediately.”

This order was not targeted at Fly Free and the others. Their target was only him, and their motive was to protect the Black Star Army, so their plan did not consist of hurting the innocents.

However, there would most likely be some people who would use this opportunity to cause problems, damaging the army’s reputation by hurting the audience. Han Xiao was quite sure that only those foreign pro guilds would do something like this.

Han Xiao did not want to stop Fly Free and the others from ‘expressing their loyalty’, but he was not going to watch people with ulterior motives damage the army.

Speaking of which, Version 4.0 is in its middle stages now, about to step into the late stage. The national war will probably occur the same time as the Super Star Cluster Alliance battle, just like my previous life. I wonder if those alliances formed by player organizations will still be founded.

Three days passed very quickly. The competition planet had already been turned into an open stadium for the award ceremony.

The main stage was a large floating platform. Only the most important guests were sitting there. It was surrounded by many smaller platforms, where the audience, media, and the winners of various items were seated.

Spherical shields shrouded the venue, blocking the cold wind in the sky and unrelated people from disrupting the closing ceremony. The inside of the shield had a virtual screen that made the venue look like a closed theater.

All kinds of spaceships floated in the exterior atmosphere. The formally dressed spectators, guests, and contestants arrived at the venue on the carriers provided by the army, found their seats, and sat down. Very soon, the venue became crowded. It was a true festival.

Fly Free and his team sat in the contestant seats, looked around, and occasionally exchanged looks with the players on the same floating platform.

Fly Free’s shoulder was tapped. He turned around and realized it was the Rivervale team’s captain, Frenzied Sword.

“When do we move?” Frenzied Sword lowered his voice. As a real loyal follower of Black Star, he also took part in the operation.

“It’s still early. No hurry. Just like the plan, when it’s our turn to receive the reward, everyone just wait for my signal and move at the same time,” Fly Free said quietly. “How many people do you think will be with US?”

“Although a lot of people signed up on the forums, it’ll be amazing if even one tenth of them actually do carry out the plan.” Fly Free shook his head.

“Okay, we’ll be waiting for your signal.”

The players who were taking part in the Saving Black Star Operation communicated privately. On the other side, there was also another group of people planning for a different operation.

On a floating audience stand, a player with the ID of ‘Winter Wolf’ asked his friend beside him through a private channel, “Are our men scattered out yet?”

“Yeah, don’t worry. Our men are scattered throughout the platforms. Some are very close to the celebrity guest seats. When those Chinese make a move, we’ll be able to act in the midst of all the chaos. We’ll definitely cause quite a lot of destruction.”

“Good.” Winter Wolf nodded and said with a low voice, “The Black Star Army faction is too strong. We have to weaken it. This is the first field operation our Northern Battlefront has carried out since its secret founding. We have to make it count to open the path for our national war plans.”

“Understood.”

At the same time, Han Xiao was welcoming the Beyond Grade A remote projections at the VIP seats on the main stage.

With his position and reputation, almost seventy percent of all Beyond Grade A members of the development union came to watch the event. They all sat at the frontmost seats. Han Xiao casually chattered and laughed with them.

As the seats at the venue were fully occupied, all the lights gradually dimmed, only leaving the main stage brightly illuminated.

Seeing this, the noisy venue quietened down. Everyone’s eyes were on the main stage.

Sylvia walked up onto the stage. She was not in her uniform, instead wearing an expensive and elegant purple bare-back dress. She wore light makeup, making her face even more exquisite and beautiful than normal. Her hair was tied up, showing her long and snow-white neck. Her silver earrings swayed lightly, reflecting light from the venue. The bright but not blinding light colored her stunning and marvelous.

She took one look around and said, “Guests, contestants, and viewers behind screens, welcome to the closing ceremony of the first Black Star Cup. I’m the army’s Chief Administrative Official, Sylvia.”

Then, Sylvia paused as stated in the script. Han Xiao smiled and applauded her. The people around followed his lead. Very soon, the venue was filled with roaring applause.

Seeing this, Sylvia then said, “As the army expands, the number of members continues to grow. The initial purpose of the Black Star Cup was to select the elites of the various professions inside the army so that the new members who are capable but not senior enough can have an extra path to rise up. At the same time, it gives the older members a chance to improve themselves. Now, the Black Star Cup has come to a fulfilling end. To our pleasant surprise, we realized just how many elites the army has in various professions…”

Sylvia started reading the script. The image was broadcast to the entire universe through the media cameras present. Of course, the Black Star Cup closing ceremony did not consist of only giving out the reward. The detailed order of the ceremony went Sylvia’s speech; the Black Star Cup organizing committee’s speech; the winners of various items going up onto the stage to accept their reward and each giving a speech; then last but not least, the army commander’s concluding speech. There were also a lot of performances and shows in between.

The army had invited many galactic celebrities, such as singers, actors, and the like. All those invited were extremely famous.

Usually, normal events would be honored to be able to invite just one of those celebrities, given how famous they were. However, the Black Star Cup was way too high class. These celebrities were the ones feeling honored to take part in the closing ceremony. This was an entertainment event hosted by a universal-level warlord, so it was an extremely excellent opportunity to build connections with people at the highest level of the society. In order to obtain a spot in the performances, the companies behind many celebrities even had intense fights.

Han Xiao was invited to the stage very soon to give the awards to the winners personally along with some words of encouragement. The remote projections of the two Vice Commanders, Lagi and Hila, stood beside him. They did not speak and only nodded at the contestants to show encouragement.

However, the reasons behind the two of them not speaking were different. Hila did not like talking, so she did not speak, while Lagi’s voice communication function was cut off by Han Xiao so that he could not speak.

The award ceremony had breaks, which were filled by the celebrity performances. As the closing ceremony was about halfway through, Han Xiao felt as if his face was twitching from smiling too much, and the spectators’ palms were also getting red from clapping too much. Finally, it was time to give the award to the outstanding contestants of the Immortals’ Square Scrimmage.

Here it is… Han Xiao focused.

The people walked onto the stage. Fly Free clenched his teeth and walked up. His back gave off a vibe as if he was walking up to an execution ground.

“Congratulations, you’re all talents of the army…”

Han Xiao read the script once more, gave Fly Free a glance, smiled in his brain, and took two steps back, giving the stage to the contestants to speak.

No one on the stage stepped forward; they all looked at Fly Free.

Fly Free nodded at everyone and walked to the lectern with heavy steps. The entire venue was extremely quiet. Everyone’s eyes were on him, waiting for his speech.

The players all subconsciously straightened their backs and became nervous, paying attention to every movement of Fly Free.

Fly Free took a deep breath, prepared himself mentally, and spoke. “I’m very proud to have achieved good results in the Black Star Cup, but that’s not what I’m going to talk about today… Just a few days ago, we discovered a shocking secret—the army commander who’s standing on this stage now is not Black Star! He’s someone else in disguise!”

Hu!

we

It was like bombs were being set off everywhere.

All the spectators, army officers, guests, celebrities, and even the Beyond Grade As present were completely startled by this sudden change. They looked at this guy and could not respond.

W-what’s going on?

“I’m a member of the Black Star Army. This is my home. I will only ever recognize Black Star as our army commander. I won’t allow anyone to disguise as our dear army commander to control the army!” Fly Free’s tone became firm as he yelled, “Today, right here, I’m going to use my life to expose this guy’s conspiracy to the entire universe! Save our leader!”

As soon as he said that, Fly Free turned around, flames erupted all over his body as he charged toward Han Xiao, screaming at the top of his lungs, “Mechanic Emperor! Die!”

At the same time, in a secret base at an unknown location, Manison’s hands trembled, and popcorn splashed all over the floor.