He looked at Luo Wanya: "You have to leave too."
"What will happen to City 10 now that all of us core members have left?" Xiaoqi asked anxiously.
Qing Chen shook his head: "The Arbitrators must have come prepared. If they left, they would still have power left; if they don't leave, they will have nothing. Hurry up and leave; this is an order."
Just then, a scream suddenly came from downstairs in the office building. Everyone held onto the corridor handrail and looked down, only to see a family member lying in a pool of blood, his heart already stopped beating.
Qing Chen asked, "What happened?"
"I don't know, I didn't notice anything happening at all!" said the person downstairs.
However, at that moment, a flowerpot suddenly fell from upstairs, hitting the person who was speaking squarely in the darkness.
Qingchen casually plucked a hair and smashed the flowerpot, but the person downstairs, in a panic, stumbled over a crack in the bricks and lost his balance, falling backward with the back of his head hitting the sharp edge of the flowerbed.
As Qing Chen's figure disappeared, he rushed to his family's side like an arrow and held their necks.
This curse is like the Grim Reaper, impossible to defend against. If it fails the first time, it will take effect a second time, and if it fails the second time, it will take effect a third time.
Each time was more unexpected and more thrilling than the last.
The parents will be cursed one after another, tens of thousands of people. Qingchen can save one, but he can't save everyone.
Xiao Qi watched this scene without saying a word. They had to leave, or they would die in a meaningless accident.
He lowered his head and said, "Just because the Puppet Master and the Arbiter have joined forces, are we forced to abandon this city that we have painstakingly built up?"
Everyone worked so hard for so long, but in the end, we still had to leave.
Qingchen looked at Xiaoqi: "Don't waste any more time. The curse will take effect one after another. There are probably already hundreds of PTA members who have died. Every minute we delay, dozens more will die. Let's go. Let's go now so that we can come back one day."
The Parents' Association left a key door in Black Leaf Plain. At this moment, Qing Ji opened the Shadow Door and smashed it. In an instant, all the core members of the Parents' Association disappeared in City 10.
Qing Chen knew he would face this moment sooner or later, so he had prepared for the evacuation long ago, but he did not expect it to come so soon.
At this moment, in City 10, Xiao Wu is working overtime and holding a meeting with the grid leaders to discuss joint defense work.
However, during the meeting, more than half of the people suddenly disappeared.
In the conference room, the remaining half of the people looked at each other in bewilderment.
Meanwhile, Xiao Ba was working overtime leading a team to inspect the factory's resumption of production and work. He was chatting with the factory manager when the manager suddenly disappeared.
The factory manager was left at a loss.
Some family members were sleeping with their wives and children when they suddenly disappeared from their homes.
This scene unfolded in various corners of City 10, and hundreds of thousands of parents were forced to evacuate!
Chapter 941, Back and Forth
War is a back-and-forth affair.
Over the past period of time, Qing Chen traveled to the Western Continent and, at a very low cost, inflicted heavy damage on the Roosevelt Kingdom.
He destroyed half of Silver City's main force, he destroyed the nuclear threat posed by the Empire's TOP military base...
He joined forces with Zhongyu to destroy hundreds of airships and kill hundreds of experts.
But now it was the other side's turn to make a move, and this move quickly dismantled the core fighting force of the parents' association, forcing them to leave for distant lands to escape the curse.
City 10 is still there, with millions of parent association members. Of those who have come forward and need to be evacuated, there are over 300,000.
Those who remained lacked high-level combat capabilities, some even below C-rank, and were unable to support a battle at the level of a conglomerate.
With just one curse, the parents' meeting was forced to back down.
Qing Chen was unsure whether the list provided by the puppeteer to the adjudicator included or excluded anyone.
He dared not gamble, because if he gambled wrong, tens of thousands of people would die.
Qingchen stood in the darkness, gazing at the night sky, where it seemed as if the Duke of Storms could be heard laughing.
Once the Arbiter's curse is formed, it's like a death knell, firmly binding everyone's heads.
The parents' meeting had already evacuated quickly enough, but in just a few minutes, more than 700 parents were killed.
The residents were awakened at midnight. Some learned what had happened and that their parents were being persecuted by the dark magic of the Western Continent and had to travel far away to gather strength.
So the residents got up one after another, took out the food they had stored at home, stuffed it into the arms of the parents' association members, and told them to take care.
Gradually, more and more residents appeared on the street, and the long street was packed with people shoulder to shoulder.
They were all there to see him off.
Qing Chen did not continue to watch the scene. Although it was touching, the purpose of war was not to be touching, but to achieve victory.
He used the vines of the Black Leaf Plain to bind Chen Yu's hands and feet, and went alone to the outside of a villa to knock on the door.
A gentle voice came from inside: "Who is it?"
"I, Qingchen, have something I'd like to ask you," Qingchen said.
The door creaked open, and Zero stood inside, while One remained on the sofa watching a soap opera.
"Is there something you need?" Zero asked with a smile.
“You must know what’s happening in City 10 right now, right?” Qingchen asked.
“I know,” Zero nodded.
"Is evacuation our only option?" Qing Chen asked seriously.
Ling scrutinized the serious-looking Qing Chen: "The optimal solution you calculated is that everyone must evacuate, right? With your strength, you are not enough to stop the enemy in the Central Plains."
“Yes,” Qingchen nodded.
In the pitch-black night, the dark clouds in the sky appeared particularly heavy.
Zero thought for a moment and said, "My calculations are the same as yours."
Qing Chen fell silent. No wonder when City 10 was recruiting talent, even the Qing family was trying to prevent people from the southwest from migrating to the Central Plains.
He originally thought it was the internal factions of the Qing family who did not want him to plunder the population, but now it seems that the old man on Ginkgo Mountain knew all along that he could not keep the city.
But why would the other side go through all that trouble to leave the city to themselves after the rat swarm?
Qingchen understood that what the other party wanted was not the city itself, but for the remaining six million people in the city to become supporters of the parents' association.
Zero continued, "According to my calculations, even if the force coming from the Western Continent is just the vanguard, it is still not something that this broken Federation can easily contend with."
"Northern Deer Island has completely collapsed. The Age of Gods has just been taken over by the Age of Gods Cloud, but the remnants of the Age of Gods have taken the Sky Fortress away. You can no longer stop Storm City and Silver City."
Therefore, once the vanguard arrives, the north will fall completely within a few days, and the Kamishiro Foundation, which Kamishiro Unra has just acquired, will be lost to the annals of history.
Zero: "If Shindai Unra cannot hold you off for 10 days, you won't even have time to evacuate. This is the most accurate calculation result."
Qing Chen took a deep breath: "What about the South?"
Zero shook his head: "If we look at military strength alone, the South might not be able to defeat the Qing Clan. But the Puppet Master is a variable; his dormancy makes everything uncertain. These past few days, you've deliberately had people send me intelligence and documents every day, and I've read them all, but there's no detailed information about the Puppet Master among them. Let's assume he really does have 12 painters dedicated to painting for their entire lives. If thousands of A-level paintings appear, are you confident you can stop them?"
“No,” Qingchen shook his head and said.
“There is no other choice. You must leave. Retreating your forces to the southwest and completely abandoning the Central Plains is the only option at present,” Zero said. “Moreover, when the main force of the Roosevelt Kingdom arrives, you will have to abandon even the southwest and hide in the vast forbidden lands.”
Ling analyzed the situation mercilessly, but Qing Chen knew very well that it was all true.
Qing Chen reached the same conclusion as the other party; he was just hoping that the artificial intelligence might have a better solution.
However, the other party also seemed powerless.
"Is there any possibility of peaceful coexistence between us and the Roosevelt Kingdom?" Qing Chen asked.
Zero chuckled and replied, "That's not a question you'd ask... Can wolves not eat meat? Wolves and sheep will never live in peace."
"Thank you," Qingchen said, turning to leave.
But just then, Zero suddenly said from behind him, "But I always feel that you might not fail."
"Why?" Qingchen asked, turning around.
“Because you have defeated me before,” Zero said with a smile.
Qing Chen remained silent.
Zero continued, "To be precise, it's not you, but your entire nation. Your weapons have never actually been the abilities of superhumans, nor the advancements brought about by technology."
"What is that?" Qingchen asked in return.
Ren Xiaosu once said that when disaster strikes, hope is the first line of defense for mankind in the face of danger.
"Thank you," Qing Chen said as he left the villa and walked into the night.
Inside the villa, Yi hugged his knees and looked at Ling: "Do you think we can win?"
"Us?" Zero was taken aback.
“Yes,” Yi asked matter-of-factly, “we’re all on the same side now.”
Ling suddenly smiled, and after thinking for a moment, she said, "Unless Ren Xiaosu comes back, we can't win."
"Oh, do I need my dad to come back? But I don't know how to contact him."
Qing Chen found Qing Ye and Qing Qu and said, "You are safe for now. The puppeteers are not yet able to infiltrate the shadow forces. Prepare to evacuate to the southwest."
Qingye suddenly opened his eyes wide and looked at Qingchen: "Boss, do you think we can't stop them?"
“Yes, we can’t stop it,” Qingchen said.
At this moment, Qing Ji opened the Shadow Gate and arrived at the garrison camp. He looked at Qing Chen and said, "Ginkgo Mountain has already planned a route for the parents' association to evacuate. All the parents' association members in City 10 must leave. We cannot help them or use the Key Gate. In addition, after Luo Wanya and others have survived the 24-hour curse period, they must also start a long march with all the parents' association members."
Qing Chen frowned: "Does the old man know what his decision means? More than 300,000 people are migrating thousands of kilometers to the southwest. They will lack food and water along the way, and the mountain roads will be rugged and winding. Many people will die! With such a convenient means as the Key Gate, why not use it?"
Qing Ji said earnestly, "He knows, but this is the fate he needs."
Qing Chen suddenly realized that the old man was deliberately training this team, even though he foresaw that City 10 would fall, he never gave any advance warning.
Qing Chen asked, "If we give up the Key Gate, many parents might die at the parents' meeting."
Qing Ji said, "The old man said that choosing an acceptable fate from all possible destinies is one of the few choices we have now."
Qing Chen took a deep breath: "I understand."
He didn't know what the other party saw through the forbidden ACE-002 chessboard, but he trusted the other party's judgment.