The Almighty Dominance (by Sunshine) novel Chapter 661

The moon hid behind thick clouds, leaving the borderlands in absolute blackness. A perfect night for thieves and rebels.

Thousands of Yellow Turbans moved like a dark tide across the dry fields outside Willowbrook, the outermost town in Yan Province.

Most of the rebels were peasants—gaunt, hollow-cheeked, and half-starved. They marched with little more than rusty sickles, crude spears fashioned from farming poles, and a handful of stolen swords.

That was why they moved so slowly.

At their head rode their leader, the wiry cultivator Zhang Hu, perched atop a gaunt horse. Torchlight danced across his face as he raised the flame high, his eyes blazing with years of accumulated fury.

“Burn everything in this village and the next!” he snarled, glancing back at his ragged army. “Take what you can carry. Leave the rest in ashes. All the way to Changyi—we burn them all!”

A savage cheer rose from the mob. They had done this before. Villages fell easily when the central government was rotten and the local lords were weak. Tonight would be no different.

They swept forward, torches flickering like a thousand angry eyes.

Suddenly, powerful jets of water exploded from the darkness above. They struck the torches with cold, mechanical precision, extinguishing the flames in sharp bursts of hissing steam. One by one, the lights vanished.

“What in the hells is this?” Zhang Hu roared, wheeling his gaunt horse in a tight circle. “Why are the lights dying?!”

“I don’t know, leader,” one peasant stammered, voice trembling. “It might just be a passing shower!”

“Light more torches now!” Zhang Hu snarled, his voice cutting through the sudden darkness. “We keep moving—no matter what!”

His men scrambled to obey, but every new flame met the same invisible assault. Water hammered down from nowhere, targeting the light.

In the rear ranks, something else began to happen in the darkness.

Men vanished.

Not dramatically. Not with screams. One moment a rebel stood clutching his torch, the next he was gone—pulled silently into the night by shadows that moved faster than human eyes could track.

Ten thousand drones, their stealth fields fully active, drifted like ghosts above and between the disorganized horde.

Each one fired a single sleeping dart into the back of a neck, then scooped up the collapsing body before it could hit the ground. The machines worked in perfect silence, their engines barely a whisper against the wind.

The rebel column continued to shrink unnoticed by those at the front.

“Sir!” someone with sharper awareness shouted. “I think some of our people are gone. We can’t hear their footsteps anymore!”

“What?” Zhang Hu barked, still shouting orders, his voice turning hoarse. “Stay quiet and keep together!”

He struck another torch alight himself. It was instantly snuffed out by a focused jet of water.

Then he felt it—something was truly wrong. “Everyone, be careful!” he growled. “The governor’s dogs are cowards. They won’t face us in open battle!”

Rage twisted his features as he wheeled around to rally the men.

Yet the field behind him was almost empty.

Hundreds had already disappeared. Then thousands. The once-mighty wave of rebels had been reduced to scattered pockets of confused men staring at one another in growing panic.

The night felt heavier now, thicker, as if the darkness itself had teeth.

“What… where are they?” Zhang Hu whispered. His cultivator senses finally screamed danger. He drew his sword, qi flaring around the blade in a faint blue glow. “Show yourselves!”

A single drone broke camouflage twenty paces away and fired.

The sleeping needle flashed through the air.

Zhang Hu’s blade moved in a blur, knocking it aside with a sharp clang.

“Pathetic!” he laughed, wild and furious. “Is this the best the so-called governor can—”

A thousand more drones revealed themselves at once.

The air filled with a deadly whisper—the sound of thousand needles launching in coordinated waves. They came from every direction, a storm of tiny steel points glinting faintly in the starless night.

Zhang Hu became a whirlwind. His sword danced in wide arcs, qi exploding outward as he tried to deflect the impossible barrage. Metal rang against metal in a continuous metallic frenzy.

He shattered dozens. Then hundreds. Sweat poured down his face. His arms burned. His breathing grew ragged.

But the drones never stopped.

They adjusted angles, anticipated his movements, and fired in overlapping patterns designed to overwhelm even a Core Formation expert.

Needles slipped through his guard—one grazing his shoulder, another embedding in his thigh. He roared and tore them out, blood spraying, but more came. Dozens more.

His vision blurred. His legs grew heavy.

“No…” he gasped, dropping to one knee. “This… this is not how…”

The final wave struck. Three needles hit his neck in quick succession. His sword slipped from numb fingers. The world tilted violently, then went black.

Zhang Hu collapsed face-first into the mud.

Silence returned to the field.

The drones worked without pause, collecting the last of the rebels. Bodies were loaded onto hovering transport platforms and carried away toward the river works.

Ten thousand captured insurgents—future labor for the dikes and canals—vanished into the night as if they had never existed.

He was a prisoner. The realization settled heavy in his gut.

He had no weapons. No path of escape. Every rebel he had marched beside that night was simply… gone.

“How much will you take from the crops I grow?” Li Wei asked, his voice rough with suspicion. He could stomach fifty percent. But if this Governor Bai demanded seventy, he would rather die with some dignity.

The voice answered calmly, “For five full years, you will pay zero taxes. Not a single grain will be taken from you. Only after those five years will you owe ten percent of any successful harvest. Should disaster strike and the harvest fail, you pay nothing.”

Li Wei froze in disbelief. “Are you serious…?”

That’s unbelievably generous. Before, the old officials forced him to hand over fifty percent regardless of how bad the harvest was.”

“Yes,” Gaia replied. “This policy applies to every villager here. Feel free to ask them yourself.”

Li Wei walked out of the modest wooden house into the morning light. Rows of cultivated land stretched before him. A farmer worked with a genuine smile on his face while his wife and children laughed and helped at his side.

All around, people moved with quiet contentment. No fear. No whips. Just families working the soil.

“If this is really true…” Li Wei whispered, a crack forming in his hardened heart. He was so tired of rebellion, tired of blood and hunger.

He wanted a peaceful life—to plant good fruit trees, watch them grow, and fall asleep every night beside his wife and children. If he could bring my wife and kids here.

Yet the words tasted bitter. He knew it was impossible. He had become a killer in his own village. There was no going back.

The voice continued, softer this time but no less firm.

“If you provide useful information about your family, we can locate and bring your family here safely. We will protect them. You will all have land. You will have a future.”

Li Wei’s knees buckled. He caught himself on the doorframe, breathing hard. His wife’s face flashed in his mind—her tired eyes, the way she had smiled at him even on the worst days.

“Really?” he whispered, voice cracking. Tears stung his eyes. He hadn’t cried since the day they took her. “You’re not lying? You can actually find her?”

The voice remained calm.

“We have already successfully relocated most of the rebels’ families who wished to come,” Gaia replied calmly. “If you provide the details, we can bring your family here too. Tell me first — how many family members do you have, and how many people do you want to bring with you?”

Li Wei sank down onto the wooden step, staring out at the rich land that now belonged to him.

Five years. No taxes. A chance to get his wife back. To build something instead of burning everything down.

Tears suddenly spilled from Li Wei’s eyes, cutting warm trails down his dirt-streaked cheeks. “Please… please help me,” he begged, voice cracking. “Bring them here to me. We want to stay here and die on this land. Please… I beg you…”

The hardened shell around his heart finally broke. All the rage, all the rebellion, crumbled away. He was just a simple man who wanted a good life for his family. If this was the way to give them peace and happiness, then he would lay down his weapons forever.

“Please… help me. Help us.”