Gus opened his mouth, but he did not know what to say.

The young man had reached the age of ignorance and passion. Sometimes, he would be woken up by the heat in the middle of the night, and he would be surprised by his own expansion.

Therefore, he knew what it was like to fall in love with a girl. He also knew what the devil meant by ‘picking up girls’.

It never occurred to him that the high and mighty gods and devils could be so… approachable and down-to-earth that they needed girls.

The young man suddenly felt that the so-called deities were no different from mortals.

In other words, even mortals could become gods and devils. Did the so-called ‘ascending’ really exist?

That night, faced with the dark future, Gus pondered for a long time.

He did not agree to the devil’s request, but he did not reject it, either.

He decided to enjoy the scenery on the way before making a decision.

In the next half month, the fleet full of mechanical demons and believers of steam demons continued sailing southward toward the Land of Hope.

Along the way, they were intercepted by the Iron Fist Legion several times.

However, the transmission of information from the Temple of Fist was too slow after all. Not many troops were sent, and the experts were not as strong as the ‘High Priest of Heavenly Saints City’.

Residents living on both sides of the river were often sympathizers and supporters in secret, if not believers of the ‘Mechanical and Steam Sect’. Besides, Gus had the support of the storm bolters and the Vulcan Machine Guns provided by the devils.

Therefore, none of the barriers could stop them successfully.

Countless soldiers of the Iron Fist Legion were blown into pieces by Gus’ fire.

As a result, Gus’s position in the hearts of the defeated soldiers grew higher and higher. The title of ‘Holy Son’ had been engraved in every believer’s heart.

They had been stray dogs who had fled in a hurry. But motivated by the arrival of the saint child, their morale was unbelievably high, as if they were marching toward the south to participate in the final battle between the Iron Fist Legion and the Steam Legion instead of the south.

Indeed, the further south the fleet went, the weaker the control of the Temple of Fist would be when they saw the scenery on both sides of the river.

It was evident from the docks on both sides of the river and the facilities in the towns.

In the beginning, when they were still in the north, the docks on both sides of the river were often driven by human beings.

They had seen countless brawny men who could carry goods weighing hundreds of kilograms on their own and stomp on the wooden planks on the dock.

He had seen countless dark-skinned, slender men whose muscles and bones were as strong as steel dragging a boat through the surging tides with cables as thick as arms.

No matter how tedious or dangerous the work was, people rarely used tools, let alone complicated machines.

But as the fleet moved southward, the Iron Fist Flag, which had been painted with iron fists, became more and more sparse and lackluster. On the contrary, tools that were driven by winches and gears to reduce the burden appeared on the dock.

The cleverly-designed levers and slings could be driven by the thin and weak ordinary people or even women, who could directly lift the goods high from the ship and slide them to the warehouse on the shore.

Further south, Gus even saw mills and factories driven by water in some villages along the river. They were running day and night, and the noises of the machines were even louder than those of the river.

Andre, commander of the fleet, told Gus that, in the south, the mills driven by water power could produce white and thin flour that was at least two levels higher than the manually-made ones in the north, but thirty to thirty percent cheaper.

In the same way, in many spinning factories in the south, water power was used to power the spinning machine. The cloth produced by the spinning machine was sturdy, light, and cheap. Even with the transportation fee to the north, it was still more cost-effective than hand-knitted cloth in the northern market.

Even the most devoted believers of the north could not help but feel tempted when they saw flour or cloth that was cheaper but of better quality.

Further south, the water power had been replaced by the more stable and powerful steam. The goods there were much more varied and cheap!

The merchants of the south secretly shipped the goods to the north to make a lot of profit. The residents of the north had never thought that there were so many delicate items in the world at such a low price.

Just like that, the treasures that were dedicated to the Temple of Fist went into the pockets of the merchants in the south.

The Temple of Fist was infuriated. Naturally, they considered the merchants of the south to be heretics and considered the goods made of machines and steam to be devils.

The Temple of Fist cut off the trade routes, captured the merchants, and sent the Iron Fist Legion deep into the swamps in the south where the water network was dense. The towns that were deemed unimportant in the beginning were demolishing machines, burning factories, and trying to suppress all the activities of the ‘Machinery and Steam Sect’.

Cutting off one’s source of income was like killing one’s parents. The so-called competition of beliefs was, in the end, a competition of interests. The merchants of the south who had their factories destroyed were not willing to sit and wait to be killed. Therefore, they organized the ‘Steam Legion’ to defend the factories and the trade routes and supported the activities of the ‘Machinery and Steam Sect’ in the north, trying to poach the members of the Fist Temple from the source.

Just like that, the ‘Riot of Steam’ grew more and more intense. To this day, the army of steam in the south was on par with the Iron Fist Legion and was even catching up to them.

If it were Gus in the past, his blood would’ve been boiling and his heart would’ve been surging. He would’ve wanted to join the Steam Legion as soon as possible as a representative of the new, vigorous forces to destroy the old, stubborn forces.

But right now, from the mouth of the devil, he had learned that the seemingly magnificent alternation of the old and the new was nothing more than a play that the ‘Punching God’ had foreseen. The people who were fighting, struggling, and sacrificing for their own destiny, the believers who believed in the true god in their heart and that a bright future was coming, were nothing more than chess pieces that the ‘Punching God’ played with at will, or even insignificant data.

The young man was both sad and angry.

He wanted to roar to the sky, but in the end, he swore in his heart.

He swore that he would make the damn Fist God—no, the damn Fist King—pay the price.

He would let the boxing champion see them—whether they were chess pieces, ants, or the will of a series of insignificant data that could be tampered with or erased at will!

Finally, half a month after they left Heavenly Essence City, the fleet sailed into the southern region.

The boundary between the north and the south was a burning, broken fortress.

The fortress that had been under the control of the Temple of Fist and guarded by the Iron Fist Legion had been breached by the Steam Legion. The seemingly solid iron wall was riddled with holes caused by the steam cannons. The Iron Fist Legion’s flag, which used to be the most brilliant and invincible army, was burning furiously on the fortress!