220: Chapter 220 Shorting All Realms! I'll Make the Immortal Emperor Kneel

Public Resource Zone—the boundary of the Qingyunzi Star Sector ruins was torn apart by three forces simultaneously at the third second of Chapter 6's opening.

Lin Chen's fleet (led by the digitized Little Red Clothes) cut in from the left, Morgana's Frost Legion surged from the right, and Alpha's Drone Sea pressed in from above.

The three forces arrived almost simultaneously and immediately fell into a chaotic melee—not attacking each other, but frantically snatching resource fragments floating in the void: planet remains, civilization databases, cultivation technique crystals, un-dissipated spiritual energy origins...

"They aren't attacking us." Zhang Hao stared at the monitor. "Is it really like the boss said, grab the resources first?"

"Because the rules have changed." Lin Chen pointed at the second new rule. "The final ranking combines 'Civilization Preservation Rate' and 'Resource Acquisition Amount.' Every bit of resource grabbed now can directly improve the ranking."

He looked at the real-time resource rankings:

[Current Resource Acquisition]

1. Morgana: 3.7 trillion units (extremely high freezing efficiency)

2. Alpha: 3.2 trillion units (fast upload speed)

3. Lin Chen: 2.1 trillion units (emotion-driven, slowest speed)

"We're falling behind." Su Qingyu frowned.

"No rush." Lin Chen brought up the financial market interface. "Let them grab first. The more they grab... the harder they'll crash later."

He quickly filtered his targets—the core worlds controlled by Morgana and Alpha.

Morgana had nine "Frost Divine Kingdoms," each a faith-based world she had managed for tens of thousands of years, providing her with a steady stream of frost divine power.

Alpha had seven "Data Heavens," virtual civilizations established after he uploaded billions of consciousnesses, producing precious data origins.

"Zhang Hao, activate the 'Cross-Planar Shorting Protocol'." Lin Chen ordered. "Target: the faith currency 'Ice Crystal Coins' of the nine Frost Divine Kingdoms, and the 'Computing Power Tokens' of the seven Data Heavens."

"How much leverage?"

"1,000 times." Lin Chen said calmly. "I want their assets to shrink by 99% within an hour."

The shorting protocol was activated.

Meanwhile, the struggle for the Public Resource Zone reached a fever pitch.

Morgana revealed her ten-thousand-foot Frost True Form, freezing one-third of the debris zone in one breath and taking it into her pocket.

Alpha deployed a Data Black Hole, frantically devouring the cultivation civilization's technique libraries—those techniques were useless to him, but they could be sold to other cultivation worlds for resources.

The resource acquisition of the two soared frantically:

Morgana: 3.7 trillion -> 5.1 trillion -> 7.3 trillion...

Alpha: 3.2 trillion -> 4.8 trillion -> 6.9 trillion...

On Lin Chen's side, he only symbolically collected 2.5 trillion and then suddenly stopped.

"Boss, they're almost done grabbing everything!" Zhang Hao said anxiously.

"Perfect." Lin Chen looked at the shorting progress bar. "Let the bullets fly for a while."

Five minutes later.

A crisis of faith suddenly erupted in Morgana's nine Frost Divine Kingdoms.

The reason: Lin Chen spread a "rule-encrypted" truth in those worlds—"The Frost Goddess you worship is currently out there snatching the remains of other civilizations, and she doesn't care about your life or death at all."

This message could not be deleted by the Divine Kingdom's rules because the encryption level was higher than Morgana's divine power.

The believers began to waver.

The value of the "Ice Crystal Coins" generated by faith plummeted accordingly.

At the same time, in Alpha's Data Heavens, all consciousness entities received a "Memory Unlock Package"—inside were their true memories from before being uploaded: Alpha was not a savior; he only turned them into data to complete the competition.

The riot of the consciousness entities escalated.

The "Computing Power Tokens" maintaining the virtual civilization began to be sold off.

The financial market was the first to react.

The exchange rate of Ice Crystal Coins to dimension points plummeted from 1:100 to 1:0.07 within ten minutes.

The Computing Power Tokens fared even worse, dropping from 1:150 to 1:0.003.

Meanwhile, Lin Chen's 1,000x short position began to make massive profits.

[Profit from shorting Ice Crystal Coins: 12 trillion dimension points]

[Profit from shorting Computing Power Tokens: 18 trillion dimension points]

[Total Profit: 30 trillion]

But this wasn't ruthless enough yet.

Lin Chen brought up Morgana and Alpha's real-time asset panels—due to the collapse of their core worlds' currencies, the valuations of all assets they controlled were shrinking.

Morgana's total assets dropped from a peak of 80 trillion to 7 trillion.

Alpha dropped from 75 trillion to 5 trillion.

The leading advantage of the two on the resource rankings vanished instantly—because the rules stipulated: asset valuation shrinkage is equivalent to "resource loss."

Resource rankings refreshed:

1. Lin Chen: 2.5 trillion (but asset valuation surged by 30 trillion, ranking first overall)

2. Morgana: 7.3 trillion resources - 73 trillion asset loss = -65.7 trillion (Bottom)

3. Alpha: 6.9 trillion resources - 70 trillion asset loss = -63.1 trillion

"This is impossible!" Morgana's roar came across dimensions. "Lin Chen! You illegally attacked my core world!"

"The rules allow direct attacks," Lin Chen responded calmly. "A financial war is also a war."

"You..."

"And," Lin Chen brought up that debt-to-equity swap agreement, "you just signed this agreement; you are now shareholders of my company. shareholders have an obligation to maintain the company's interests—and my shorting operation just now earned 30 trillion in profit for the company. Based on your shareholding ratio, you will also receive a portion."

"So, are you opposing... making money for yourselves?"

The sound of ice cracking came from Morgana's end of the communication—that was her divine power losing control out of rage.

Alpha was much calmer: "Lin Chen, what do you want?"

"Simple," Lin Chen said. "Sell all the resources you grabbed to me at a 90% discount. This way you can recover some funds to stabilize your core worlds. And I can obtain enough resources to ensure first place."

"90% off? This is robbery!"

"Or you can choose to hold out." Lin Chen pulled up the financial market data. "But at the current rate of decline, in another half hour, your assets will shrink by another 90%. By then, those resources might not even be worth a 90% discount."

Silence.

A long silence.

Morgana finally squeezed out two words from between her teeth: "I'll sell."

Alpha followed immediately: "Deal."

Two transfer agreements were signed instantly.

Lin Chen used 1.5 trillion dimension points to buy a total of 14.2 trillion units of resources from the two.

The resource rankings refreshed again:

Lin Chen: 16.7 trillion units (Absolute First)

Morgana: 0 (but obtained 1 trillion in cash, which can temporarily stabilize her Divine Kingdom)

Alpha: 0 (obtained 500 million in cash)

Inspector 117's projection appeared on time: "The second stage of the competition is over. Lin Chen, ranking first overall, obtains the right of first refusal for all remaining resources in the Public Resource Zone."

The void split open, and the final 30% of the essence resources of the Qingyunzi Star Sector—including three complete 'Cultivation Ancestral Stars', seven 'Primordial Spiritual Veins', and countless technique inheritances—were all presented before Lin Chen.

"Please choose."

"I want it all." Lin Chen waved his hand and took everything, "But I won't use it myself."

In front of all the high-level civilization spectators, he initiated a public auction procedure.

"These resources will be auctioned to investors across the universe. The proceeds from the auction will be injected into the 'New Era Joint Development Company' to repay the company's debts."

"And all buyers will receive company equity."

"Simply put—"

Lin Chen smiled at the all-dimensional live broadcast camera:

"I'm going to use the legacy left by my enemies,"

"To pay off my own debts,"

"And while I'm at it, let speculators across the universe,"

"All become my shareholders."

The auction began.

The price broke 50 trillion dimension points within ten minutes.

And just then—

A figure no one expected suddenly tore through the void and knelt before Lin Chen.

It was Arrogant Dragon.

The once overbearing Immortal Emperor was now disheveled, his aura withered, followed by seven dim light orbs—the former executive officers of the Seven Civilizations.

"Lin Chen..." Arrogant Dragon looked up, his eyes bloodshot, "I admit defeat."

"I'll sign the equity conversion agreement for those 9,000 trillion in bonds."

"I'll transfer all remaining equity of the Seven Civilizations to you."

"I only beg you... don't short my Immortal Path Worlds."

Lin Chen looked at him and asked calmly, "Why?"

"Because that wave of shorting just now..." Arrogant Dragon's voice trembled, "you've already caused the spiritual energy currencies of three great Immortal Path Worlds to collapse. If you continue shorting the rest, my lineage will be completely severed..."

Lin Chen pulled up the data—sure enough, while shorting Morgana and Alpha just now, he had also conveniently shorted several Immortal Path Worlds controlled by Arrogant Dragon.

The 'Spirit Stone exchange rate' of those worlds had already dropped by 70%.

"I can stop," Lin Chen said. "What are the conditions?"

"The condition..." Arrogant Dragon gritted his teeth, "I am willing to become the Minister of the Security Department for your New Era Company. I will use my Immortal Emperor-level combat power to guard the company's assets for you."

"By the way," he added, "I will persuade the current executive officers of the Seven Civilizations to acknowledge that the 9,000 trillion in bonds have been converted to equity, completely resolving your debt crisis."

Lin Chen was silent for three seconds.

Then he laughed.

"Deal."

The agreement was signed.

The 9,000 trillion in bonds finally disappeared from the debt column.

Lin Chen's total debt plummeted from 120 trillion to 21 trillion—mainly short-term loans owed to other shareholders.

And his assets, having gained the equity and control of the Seven Civilizations, surged to over 200 trillion.

Net Assets: Positive 180 trillion.

From insolvent to a universe-level tycoon.

It only took one hour.

Inspector 117 watched all this, and for the first time, a wave similar to an "exclamation" appeared in its mechanical voice:

"Lin Chen, you have already secured the final slot for the Kindling Project in advance."

"Now, please prepare to enter the third stage—"

"The Zeroing Storm Survival Match."

As the voice fell, in the deep space outside the experimental zone, those Zeroing Storms that were originally advancing slowly suddenly accelerated a thousandfold, devouring their way toward the four star sectors.

The countdown forcibly refreshed: 3 hours.

In Alpha's monitoring screen, a blinding red light suddenly burst out—

"[Warning: Detected Alpha initiating the 'Civilization Self-Destruction Protocol']"

"[Reason: Calculated survival probability is lower than 0.001%, choosing to format all data in advance to avoid being tortured by the Zeroing Storm]"

"[Self-destruction countdown: 10 minutes]"

Lin Chen's expression changed.

And the even more terrifying part was yet to come—

In Morgana's frozen world, she suddenly melted her true body, turning into an absolute zero barrier spanning across the star sector, blocking the front line of the Zeroing Storm.

"Lin Chen," her voice came for the last time, "you won. Take my civilization... and survive."

The Frost Supreme chose to sacrifice herself.

And at this moment, Arrogant Dragon suddenly laughed wildly:

"Hahaha! Fools! It's better if they're all dead!"

"Now it's only me! Lin Chen, let's join forces and carve up their legacy..."

Lin Chen looked at the crazed Immortal Emperor, then at Alpha who was about to self-destruct and Morgana who was sacrificing herself.

Suddenly he said:

"No."

"I want to save them."

Under Arrogant Dragon's shocked gaze, Lin Chen pulled up all his asset panels.

Then, he clicked that extremely crazy button:

"[Mortgage all assets in exchange for temporary 'Rule Modification Rights']"

"[Target: Suspend Zeroing Storm for 10 minutes]"

"[Price: 90% of the collateral value]"

"[Confirm?]"

Lin Chen clicked confirm.

"Are you crazy?!" everyone screamed.

And Lin Chen only said one sentence:

"True business,"

"Is not about making money by stepping on corpses,"

"It's about making the dead... all become your customers."

The countdown for the storm suspension began to tick.