Forty Millenniums of Cultivation - Chapter 250

Chapter 250: Crazy Digestion

One student raised his hand and asked, “What’s an infiltration squad of silver-blood demons doing in the Heaven’s Origin Sector?”

Mao Feng glanced at him and explained the reason.

The principle of the demon clan was utterly different from that of human society. There was no warmth at all. The one creed that they cherished most was ‘survival of the fittest’. They were extremely harsh both to others and to themselves.

The competition among the silver-blood demons was fierce, too. If a young demon wanted to rise up in the demon world, not only did they need to go through hard training to increase their strength, they would also need to recruit their own subordinates.

For the demons, the fastest way to improve their abilities was to fight against humans by sneaking into the Heaven’s Origin Sector.

What’s more, most of the relatively stronger bronze-blood and black-blood demons in the Blood Demon Sector already had their masters and wouldn’t change to a different one easily.

In comparison, there were many wild demon beasts in the Dark Desolate Domain.

Most of the beasts were never enlightened by any civilization. Although their brains had as much potential wisdom as any human being or silver-blood demon, their way of life was simple and muddled.

In the meantime, under the nourishment of the furious spiritual energies, there were many mutant demon beasts in the wilderness which were far stronger than the common ones and almost equal to high-level demon generals and even general kings.

Such strong-bodied and simple-minded demon beasts were naturally the best subordinates for a young and inexperienced demon.

Therefore, many silver-blood demons would risk going to the Heaven’s Origin Sector, partly because they would receive good training here, and partly because they wanted to tame some strong demon beasts and turn the beasts into servants which would help them in their rise to power in the Blood Demon Sector.

So, the Dark Desolate Domain was the human beings and demon clan’s mutual training field and arena.

Although neither of the two parties were able to commit a large number of troops to the place, it was possible for them to establish a small teleportation array which could send around twenty soldiers to the other’s world.

Not only silver-blood demons would sneak into the Dark Desolate Domain in pairs, strong men of the Star Glory Federation sometimes would crawl into the Blood Demon Sector that was on the opposite side of the Dark Desolate Domain, too.

Infiltration and anti-infiltration, assassination, ambush, guerrilla warfare… were constant in this brutal battlefield.

“However, don’t freak out. We’re going to do our training on the outskirts of the Dark Desolate Domain. Normally, silver-blood demons would never come here.”

Mao Feng smiled confidently, “Besides, with the enhancement of the crystal suits, of the 25 people here, twenty students are beyond the peak of the Refinement Stage and on the verge of the Building Foundation Stage, and the five instructors are close to the Core Formation Stage.

“With our combat ability, even if we meet an infiltration squad of the silver-blood demons, there is no need to fear them. Just fight and see who gets the last laugh!

“Alright, let’s start out training now!”

…

After a final check of the crystal suit, each student carried enough crystals, flying swords, and ammo. They dispersed and started searching in groups of five with one instructor in each.

Although there was no Spiritual Nexus in the Dark Desolate Domain, short-distance communication was still available when the weather was tranquil.

In every group, the four students would always stay in the communication range of their instructor, so that the instructor could come to their rescue the moment they called for help.

Four distinguished students, including Li Yao and Long Qianyue, went to an azure lake led by Mao Feng.

The lake seemed to be peaceful, but the piles of bones around suggested otherwise.

Water was the source of life. Even the strongest demon beast needed water, too. Therefore, countless demon beasts lurked around the lake, making it a concealed slaughterhouse.

The arrival of five strangers was immediately detected. After a clattering sound, many logs appeared in the middle of the lake and submerged after floating for a while quietly.

Rustling noises came from the two-meter tall demonic plants that resembled bulrushes which bent down instantly. Within a moment, heavy panting could be heard.

In the sky, many strange grey birds were hovering overhead maliciously; they looked like a combination of eagles and bats. Their wings spanned more than ten meters with sharp edges like blades that were shining coldly in the air.

They were not strong enough to hunt. So, they could only hope that the strong hunters hiding around the lake would leave some leftovers after they enjoyed the humans in the iron tanks.

Soon, on the left side of the team, three rhino-like, giant demon beasts, with big bone hammers at the end of their extremely thick tails, known as ‘Blood Mallet Rhino’, appeared from the demonic bulrushes.

On the team’s right, two giant crocodiles that were more than ten meters long with bronze bone armors all over their bodies opened their hideous, smelly mouths.

“Hee! Hee!”

The strange birds in the sky cried like children chillingly.

“Li Yao, Long Qianyue, the strength of the five demon beasts are between that of high-level demon soldiers and low-level demon generals, which is perfect for your practice. Who wants to go first?”

Li Yao and Long Qianyue looked at each other and rushed out simultaneously.

Crazy killing ensued!

…

As the days went by, the lake turned from azure to crimson, and there were more and more demon beast bones around the lake. Li Yao was improving at an amazing speed!

On the third day of the field trip…

“Shua!”

Li Yao crouched on the ground. He dashed below a Blood Mallet Rhino like a cunning viper with a twist of his body and subtle manipulation of the power rune arrays. After he flashed to the back of the demon beast, the crystal camera on the back of his head immediately locked onto the target. He slashed the crescent saber backwards deep into the abdomen of the demon beast without turning around.

The Blood Mallet Rhino weighed more than 20 tons and had solid armor all over its body. When it was running, it was like a crystal tank. Its only weakness was a soft spot on its abdomen.

Li Yao pulled heavily. The brightness formed by his spiritual energy was more than three meters long, which cut all the inner organs of the Blood Mallet Rhino into pieces.

Then he squatted and dodged the demon beast’s dying counterattack. At last, he dashed forward dozens of meters away.

The whole attack was so fluid that it only took less than two seconds.

The Blood Mallet Rhino roared. It tried to turn around and rush to Li Yao, only to collapse after several steps.

In the sky, many hovering scavengers called ‘Chuckling Baby Bird’ dived down, hoping to steal the fresh food.

“Shua!”

The Shattered Star Bombarder on the back of the Bloody Blade Battlesuit flipped up to the left shoulder and fired. Four masses of red air swelled out and hit the four Chuckling Baby Birds in the lead precisely.

The four masses of air were like four lumps of magma which could not be rid of once it was touched.

Soon, with ear-piercing screeches, the four Chuckling Baby Birds were burnt to ashes and fell to the ground.

The other birds all dispersed and didn’t regather for a long time. When they came back, their chuckles turned into low curses.

Not knowing what to do, they could only float hundreds of meters above Li Yao’s head and pooped on him to vent their anger. But, of course, could such beasts hit the nimble Li Yao?

…

On the seventh day of the field trip…

Li Yao stood still, his saber hidden on his back like a serpent in a crevice. He was confronting a Blood Mallet Rhino.

“BOOM!”

The Blood Mallet Rhino lowered its head and started charging at full speed.

It was not until the horn of the demon beast nearly pierced into his chest that Li Yao dodged to the side in his Bloody Blade Battlesuit.

Simultaneously, his saber moved like lightning and slashed at the neck of the rhino with the frightful speed of lightning and thunder.

The neck of the Blood Mallet Rhino was covered in dense armor, too. One slash, even if boosted by spiritual energy, was not enough to cut it open.

However, it was not Li Yao’s first slash.

During the time of the seemingly single slash, Li Yao had already attacked eight times at the same spot, which left a clear trace on the armor of the Blood Mallet Rhino.

The ninth attack finally surpassed the limit of the armor. The bone armor was ripped open and the saber pierced through. A surge of spiritual energy then cut off all the arteries and organs inside the demon beast.

“Puff!”

When the saber left the demon beast’s body, a cluster of blood was squeezed out.

The Blood Mallet Rhino collapsed, not even able to give a dying scream.

As for the Chuckling Baby Birds, none of them dared to steal food from this formidable human being anymore.

…

On the twentieth day of the field trip, Li Yao sat alone with his legs crossed on one side of the lake.

Below him was a strange gold snake that was more than thirty meters long with two small spikes on its head.

Critical part of the snake had almost been slashed into two pieces. The only reason that it remained intact was its skin. Blood of the snake flowed along the ground, emitting a weird fragrance.

Li Yao put the big gallbladder of the snake over a leaf, then he took out a piece of square-shaped magical equipment named ‘Fiery Wave Box’ and aimed at the gallbladder.

“Shua!”

The Fiery Wave Box shot out a green light which enveloped the gallbladder. A one-minute countdown was displayed on the box.

One minute later, the green light disappeared automatically, and the snake gallbladder was already cooked and ready to eat.

Li Yao was desperately hungry. He grabbed the gallbladder and finished it in several bites.

Not satisfied, he chopped off a slice of the snake flesh and cooked it together with the snake heart.

The mutant demon beasts in the Dark Desolate Domain, nourished by the spiritual energies of both worlds, contained far more spiritual energy than those on the outside, which made them the best food ingredients.

However, most Cultivators only had a limited stomach. For a Building Foundation Stage expert such as Mao Feng, his meal was no more than that of the lower-level Cultivators.

The wagons that they brought would need to load the Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures as well as precious materials from demon beasts. There was no way that they would carry a lot of beast meat back.

Except for the part they ate while they were here, most of the meat would be taken advantage of by the scavenger demon beasts such as the Chuckling Baby Birds.

But Li Yao was different.

The most important art that he learnt from the Hundred Smelting Clan 40,000 years ago was the Art of the Swallowing Whale, a food-eating technique.

Back when he was an ordinary man, he had already been able to devour dozens of cans of the Giant Creatures of Starry Skies meat.

Now that he was already at the 7th level of the Refinement Stage, his stomach was much bigger than before, which could almost be called a bottomless hole.

Endless invaluable demon beast meat was sent into his belly and absorbed by him.

During the past half a month, he’d eaten so much good stuff that it was enough to feed a common Cultivator for years.

Chapter 251: Arrival of Enemies

With the nourishment of the Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures, although his level hadn’t advanced yet, Li Yao’s understanding of the Thousand Tempering Hundred Refining technique, the strongest quenching body exercise of the Hundred Smelting Clan, had reached a whole new level.

When he stretched the spiritual energy inside his body and brought the Thousand Tempering Hundred Refining technique to maximum, his body no longer was the color of brass. The essence of the technique had sunk deeper into his body. Except for the deep gold color on his body that was occasionally visible, he looked exactly the same as any other person.

But his resistance had more than doubled.

Body strength of a body practitioner, magical equipment control of a refiner, and combat skills of an Exo had integrated perfectly in Li Yao.

…

On the 25th day of the field trip, Li Yao had become the focus of the other 19 students.

He was the weakest among all the students.

All the students who passed the first two rounds of the elimination match were in the high level of the Refinement Stage, except for him who was only in the middle level of the Refinement Stage.

But once he put on the crystal suit, his combat ability was almost equal to Long Qianyue, the top expert of all the students, if not better in some regards.

None of the students who had seen Li Yao’s combat in his crystal suit were not astonished and shocked at his tough style.

In their eyes, Li Yao was playing with fire, and he risked being seriously wounded by demon beasts at any moment.

The combat style was what they desired yet could not learn, because it was based on Li Yao’s profound understanding of the structure of the crystal suit as well as the robustness of his body.

As the days went by, Li Yao’s trophy collection grew larger and larger.

“Did you hear it? Li Yao killed a Frost Triangle Chimera and got two precious soft scales for chest protection from it!

“Plus, the tailbone from the Green Paw Dragon Snake! Damn, he’s already earned roughly a million in the past two days!”

The twenty students were all proud of themselves and competed with each other secretly. They observed other people’s collections every day.

But most of them soon discovered to their dismay that two students gathered much more than any of the rest of them, who, moneywise, earned more than double of what any other students did.

One of the two students was Li Yao, and the other was Long Qianyue.

They were the well-deserved strongest students of this batch!

…

Thirtieth day of the field trip.

“Today is the last day of your field trip, which means that the three months of Exo training has come to an end!”

The twenty students sat in a circle. Mao Feng was standing in the middle and said, “Three months ago, many of you were ignorant beginners; some were even super newbies who had never touched crystal suits before.

“But after three months of training, as qualified Exos, you are all able to go hunting in the Dark Desolate Domain in middle-level and low-level crystal suits now.

“However, in order to be formally acknowledged by the Thunder Training Camp and to get the ‘Thunder Exo’ badge, you have one last conquest to complete.

“Tonight, everybody will take a good rest. Starting from 5 o’clock tomorrow morning to 5 o’clock the day after, the 24 hours will be your free hunting time.

“During the day and the night, you will try your best to hunt down demon beasts that are most valuable in your eyes. At the end of the match, the worth of your trophies will be the criterion to determine the final winners.

“The top ten will receive the title of ‘Thunder Exo’, and when they reach the Building Foundation Stage, they will have the opportunity to be instructed by Lei Tingwei, the Core Formation Stage strong man, in person!”

Mao Feng’s words set the crowd in ablaze.

Every student was so excited that their faces were flushed and veins were appearing on the backs of their clenched hands.

As one of the four major training camps, the Thunder Training Camp was even better recognized than many battlesuit majors of the famous universities.

‘Thunder Exo’ not only meant that they could be personally taught by a Core Formation Stage Cultivator, but also proved that they were competent enough in the new generation of the world of Exos. Major sects would hire them with decent payment, and their future career paths would be unhindered. Chances were that they might even be able to marry a daughter of the leader of their sects and thus inherit it one day. They would arrive at the peak of their life easily.

Li Yao was anxious, too, and couldn’t wait for the dawn to come.

During the three-month training, besides crystal suit driving skills, he also grasped much knowledge about crystal suit maintenance and modification.

He was hoping to conclude the training satisfactorily and return to the Grand Desolate War Institution to refine the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit together with his professor.

Right then, a delicate, blade-like figure came close to him.

It was Long Qianyue.

Long Qianyue had a long face. Her chin stood out a little bit, making her less pretty than she was supposed to be. But she had a fair skin through which one could see her veins.

Her eyeballs, which seemed to have been carved out of two crystals, were translucent.

“Li Yao, it’s a pity that we haven’t had a chance to confront each other over the last month since the second elimination match.

“I hope that we’re both lucky tomorrow to reap enough booty to decide who the winner is between us.”

Long Qianyue’s eyes were glittering. She continued, “People say that we’re the top students in this class. It’s hilarious. How can there be two top students?

“I would rather be defeated and stay in the second place temporarily than share the first place with someone else.

“I believe that you are the same as me, aren’t you?”

Li Yao stared at her in the eyes and grinned a moment later.

He rose up, feeling that every artery in his body was inching and every cell expanding.

Unable to control it any longer, he decided to practice the Thunderous Tornado Saber Art while the night was still young.

…

There was no moon in the sky. Many giant swirls made of stars were spinning in the sky, crushing and swallowing each other.

Endless natural spiritual energies flooded out towards the ground of the Dark Desolate Domain from the center of the swirls like volcano eruptions.

“Swoosh!”

Under the mad starry sky, a rainbow-like laser flashed in the darkness, which was caught up with and hit heavily by two faster lightness.

The rainbow-like laser came to a halt and revealed its true self, a dreadful demon beast that looked like a hybrid of a lion and a dragon.

It had a lion head, but its body was long and narrow which was covered by deep gold scales like the body of a dragon.

It had legs as strong as those of a lion and paws as sharp as those of a dragon. Silver blood could be found on the tip of the paws.

On two sides of its body grew two wings that looked like those on a bat. However, they were folded close to the body, indicating that they could only be used for sprinting but not flying.

The most attractive part of the demon beast was its caltrop-like dragon tail that was galvanizing in darkness like clusters of crystals condensed together.

A lion dragon, a hybrid of a liger demon beast, and a dragon demon beast!

And it was not just a common lion dragon. Judging from its bizarre shape, it must’ve been mutated by the intense spiritual energies somewhere in the Dark Desolate Domain.

Its capability was almost equal to that of a demon king!

However, the demon-king level mutant lion dragon was not in its best state.

It quickly rose up after it was knocked over. Roaring back to something in darkness behind, it accelerated and disappeared into the murky forest.

A moment later, more than twenty figures showed up where the mutant lion dragon just fell over.

They looked very similar to human beings, with distinguishable limbs and face, albeit not devoid of characteristics of beasts.

They were in a glorious panoply. Besides cold weapons such as swords and saber, they were also carrying heretical thermal weapons.

It was an infiltration squad from the demon clan!

A young demon, with a strong air of leadership, stood in the middle of the circle of demons. Few features of beasts could be found on his body. At first look, he looked just like a tall, handsome young man.

He had gold curly hair and gold eyes. Even his neatly-trimmed beard was completely gold, too. He was wearing bright gold battle armor decorated by crystals that formed the head of a roaring lion. His countenance was also as majestic as that of a lion.

A wicked, tongue-wagging demon walked out of the circle and crouched to the ground with four limbs. The tip of his nose was bouncing hard as he tried to smell something from the ground. A moment later, he found a blood spot.

“Young master, this mutant lion beast has been wounded and its blood is flowing out. It will be easier next time!

“We can definitely track it by its blood so that we can tame it and make it your subordinate!” the demon dog said in a high pitch.

The demon clan was created by human beings. Many of their training technique were actually based on the Cultivation arts of the human beings. Therefore, they spoke the human language, too.

“Very good!”

The voice of the ‘young master’ was hoarse, yet with a strange attractiveness. He observed, “I never expected that I would discover a demon-king level mutant lion dragon on this trip to the Heaven’s Origin Sector. My influence will grow much stronger once I subdue it. You will all be rewarded according to your contribution when everything is done!

“Let’s follow the mutant lion beast from a greater distance so that it won’t come at us. It is in the demon-king level and far stronger than any of us. But as long as we stalk it, my two teachers here will find an opportunity to deal with it!”

Two invisible demons covered in mysterious black mist snorted in agreement.

Wild demon beasts, especially strong ones such as the mutant lion dragon, were proud animals to the bone and unwilling to listen to any commands easily.

To tame them, the best way was to beat them into a grievous state and let someone treat it, during which time manipulation shackles would be enforced to their brains.

Only with both stick and carrot, as well as the manipulation shackle, could a wild demon beast be tamed.

“Hurry! I want this mutant lion dragon sitting at my feet like a cat before dawn!”

The young master waved his hands. The demons vanished into the forest.

Chapter 252: Blood Hand and Night Owl

The next day at dawn, on the Thunderous Sound Mountain at the corner of the Dark Desolate Domain…

It was the most intimidating mountain in the southeast part of the Dark Desolate Domain. Shrouded by demonic plants, the world inside the mountain was gloomy and drab even if the purple sun was shining brightly outside.

Li Yao hid himself inside a clump of crimson bushes. He withdrew his spiritual energy as much as he could with the Soul Converging Technique. Not only did he smear a layer of mud on his crystal suit, he also wrapped it up with camouflage cloth with stealth rune arrays.

He had completely melted into the dark forest.

A red bird with sharp teeth stopped over his head, only to be tied up by a spider thread from the trunk hole nearby and dragged into the hole without a dying scream. The sound of cracking of bones came from inside the hole.

A thin scent of blood could be smelled.

Neither the predator nor the prey detected Li Yao’s existence.

Li Yao was a bit irritated. These second-rate demon beasts were not the trophies that he was looking forward to.

Demon beasts around the anonymous lake had almost all been eradicated by him. Due to his desire for victory, Li Yao risked entering into the Thunderous Sound Mountain. But more than half a day had been gone and not even one valuable demon beast had come by.

Had he known it previously, he would’ve stayed in the plateau and gone hunting there.

“Come on, big fellows! Otherwise, I would have to be a rogue hunter.”

A rogue hunter in the Thunderous Sound Mountain would be in much more peril than ambushing would.

Many predators were lurking in darkness waiting for the audacious preys to fall into their trap.

After careful consideration, Li Yao finally dropped the thought.

He was not strong enough for the task. Ambushing in the outskirts of the Thunderous Sound Mountain was already the best he could do. Besides, this place was still within the range of communication. He could call for the instructor if anything should happen.

But if he were deep into the Thunderous Sound Mountain, he would not be able to reach out to the instructors, and if he were surrounded by strong demon beasts, there would be no one that could save him.

Li Yao had always been a patient man. But after wasting more than an hour in the bush, he felt that he couldn’t bear it any longer. The weather was muggier and muggier, too.

“BOOM! CRACK!”

Right then, a furious thunder boomed from high above.

Within a moment, countless thunders echoed with one another as if a bloody battle was going on in the sky.

Clouds rolling, purple lightning dancing, rain pouring.

The forest became a world of swelling water.

Many giant purple trees in the forest were reverberating with the thunder. Some even attracted the lightning toward them and sent them out from the branches, forming an intensely knotted electric net above the forest.

The trees were a special kind of demonic plants in the Dark Desolate Domain known as ‘Thunder Echo Plant’. Naturally endowed with thunder attributes, they tended to attract thunder and lightning during a storm before forming an electric net above the forest and sending out thunder roars.

This was also how the Thunderous Sound Mountain got its name.

“Damn weather.”

Li Yao frowned and cursed. He heard background noise in the communication channel, which had been jammed by the thunder.

Hesitating no more, Li Yao jumped out of the bush and decided to return to the plateau where he could still hunt down some low-level demon beasts under the protection of the instructors.

But the moment he stepped out, he detected surging spiritual waves like tides coming from deep down the forest. Then, hundreds of demon beasts appeared from darkness and dashed towards him.

“What the hell?!”

Li Yao’s heart skipped a beat.

The scents on the demon beasts were all very strong, indicating that many of them were high-level demon soldiers and some were even demon generals. But they were all fleeing in such a desperate hurry that there was not time for them to bother an intruder like Li Yao.

Li Yao’s blood was freezing.

What kind of hunter could frighten hundreds of demon beasts like this?

Run!

Li Yao made the decision instantly.

However, before he was able to turn around, an iron, cold feeling pricked his heart. His pores were sealed unconsciously in response. Spiritual energy was flowing all over his body. Spiritual shield was brought to maximum.

“Shua!”

A rainbow laser flashed beside him. It was a hideous mutant lion dragon!

Somehow disturbed by his presence, the lion dragon waved its paws impatiently.

It was not meant to be an attack, but more like a human being who was waving his arms to drive away the flies.

“BOOM!”

Li Yao felt that a thunder had directly hit his spiritual shield and left many cracks on it through which demon power penetrated into his limbs and organs.

In a dull grunt, Li Yao was blown away. He tried to change his direction more than ten times while he was airborne, but none of it succeeded and he ended up crashing into a tall tree.

With a cracking sound, the tree was broken into two pieces and hurtled to the ground.

‘What a formidable demon beast!’ Li Yao screamed in his mind. Never had he been so shocked before.

Thankfully, he had triggered the spiritual shield in time and brought his defense to his best with the Thousand Tempering Hundred Refining technique.

Also, the mutant lion dragon wasn’t aiming at him. All it did was wave its paws at him.

His body wasn’t injured, but he was agitated from the bottom of his heart.

‘Demon king level!

‘This mutant lion dragon is definitely a king-level demon beast!

‘Judging from the wounds and blood on its body, it seems to be on the run, too, which means that something stronger was chasing after it.’

The conclusion gave Li Yao goosebumps all over his body.

After a moment’s rest, the mutant lion dragon dashed into darkness in rainbow laser again.

Li Yao didn’t dare to stay. He rose up and fled in the opposite direction of the mutant lion dragon in the stealth mode.

Three minutes later.

“Shua! Shua! Shua! Shua!”

The demon squad showed up where Li Yao and the mutant lion dragon had just stood.

After days and nights of hunting, all the demons looked weary.

The young master, who had gold hair and gold eyes, was apparently more irked than before.

“Wait!”

Before the demons continued on their hunting, the black mist enveloping one of the demons split and revealed a snake face. His thin pupils blinked as he croaked, “I seem to sense the scent of a human being.”

The demon was solemn. He twisted to and fro in the place where the mutant lion dragon just stood, then he found the bush where Li Yao had hidden himself, and he traced back to the tree crushed by Li Yao eventually.

His snake eyes blinked. His bifurcated tongue rolled up and down as he mumbled something unclear. In the end, he opened his mouth and exhaled a green mist.

The mist flowed in the air and consolidated into a cluster of shadows, which was the blurred picture of a Bloody Blade Battlesuit dancing and crushing into the tree.

“Not an expert. Peak of the Refinement Stage, at best. The crystal suit is the Bloody Blade Battlesuit from a hundred years ago,” the demon said in relief.

The young master pondered for a while and said, “Following the mutant lion dragon, we’ve already reached the edge of the Dark Desolate Domain. Many low-level Cultivators have been training around here. This Refinement Stage Cultivator in Bloody Blade Battlesuit must be one of them, which means he has companions outside of the forest.

“If he escapes and informs them of the existence of our prey, it will be a nuisance.

“However, with the thunderstorm and chaotic spiritual energy fluctuations in the forest, we might lose the mutant lion dragon’s tracks if we are delayed for a while.

“We’ve been hunting it for such a long time. There’s no way that we’re giving it up at the doorstep of victory.

“Blood Hand! Night Owl!”

Two demons stepped forward.

The demon on the left looked like a hybrid of a human and a wolf. There was crimson fur on his both hands, which seemed to be soaked in blood.

The demon on the right had dense feathers all over his body. He had two big eyes that were glittering brutally like two dim lights, but there were no pupils in the eyes.

The young master continued, “You are both low-level demon generals adept at jungle hunting. You should be more than enough to deal with the Cultivator, who, at best, is only at the peak of the Refinement Stage.

“Now, after you follow up and kill this ignorant Cultivator who doesn’t know what he’s doing, contact us through our secret technique. I’ll tell you the rendezvous then.

“Remember, if you find other Cultivators, give up the hunt immediately and report to me.

“The rest of us will continue chasing the mutant lion dragon until we completely take control of it under the lead of my teachers.”

“Yes, sir!”

Blood Hand and Night Owl nodded at the same time.

Night Owl, who had feathers all over his body, grinned hideously.

“What can a Refinement Stage Cultivator in a Bloody Blade Battlesuit from a hundred years ago do? We will not let him walk out of this forest alive. Before dark, he’ll be ripped into pieces!”

Blood Hand added, “That’s right. Rest assured while you continue with the hunt, young master. Maybe by the time we tear this Cultivator apart, you will have already tamed the mutant lion dragon. After that, with the increase of your power, we’ll need to address you as ‘prince’!”

These words were exactly what the young master had been hoping for. He beamed in satisfaction and waved his hands.

“Let’s move out!”

The demons were divided into two teams.

Most of them followed the mutant lion dragon by tracing of its blood, whereas Blood Hand and Night Owl, the two demon generals best at jungle hunting, pursued Li Yao by whatever inconspicuous marks he had left behind.

Ten minutes later, Li Yao, who was rushing in the forest, was alerted of something behind him and noticed the two haunting ‘tails’.

Chapter 253: Two Demon Generals? Die Now!

“Someone’s following me!”

Li Yao bit his lips so hard that blood was flowing out.

The pain refreshed him and calmed him down.

“This is the edge of the Dark Desolate Domain. Neither a general-king level mutant lion dragon nor demons that are even stronger than it should appear in this place.

“The only reasonable explanation is that a powerful infiltration squad was hunting the mutant lion dragon, which led the squad to this place when the squad discovered me.

“They’re afraid that I might expose them when I get out of the forest. So, some of them were sent out to kill me.

“But their main force must be still chasing the mutant lion dragon.

“In such a savage thunderstorm, a king-level demon beast such as the mutant lion dragon is not that easy to capture. It’s not likely that they’re giving up the hunting just for me.”

“Therefore, my pursuers won’t be numerous.”

“Unfortunately, with the electric net formed by the Thunder Echo Wood, there’s no way to fly in the sky. The communications have been jammed, too.

“At my current speed, it will take at least thirty minutes for me to get out of the forest, which is more than enough for them to catch up with me.

“Only by killing them can I avoid being killed.”

There was coldness in Li Yao’s eyes. He recalled the days when he was hunted by the gangsters in the magical equipment graveyard.

With death at his doorstep, he felt like his body was burning. Glancing around, he noticed a thorny bush and hid himself in it before covering it with camouflage cloth.

“Swoosh! Swoosh!”

One minute later, two figures flashed dozens of meters away from the bush and continued searching to the foot of the mountain.

The intense air of demon on their bodies alarmed Li Yao. Neither was the information displayed on the Demon Beast Detector very pleasing.

“Two demon generals? Good for you!”

Li Yao knew that the two pursuers wouldn’t be delayed for long by his ploy. They must be experts in jungle hunting, and the only reason that they didn’t discover him just now was because they thought he would try everything he can to get out of the mountain and didn’t bother to check the place where his scent stopped.

But it wouldn’t take long before they found out that he was hiding somewhere instead of running.

Li Yao was going to make best use of the time when they were stuck by their error.

Jumping out of the bush, he dashed in the direction where the two demon generals just came and went back into the depths of the mountain.

While he was rushing in the forest, he checked the magical equipment that he carried.

Thankfully, besides the crescent saber and the portable crystal railgun, he had brought a lot of miscellaneous escape magical equipment, in case there were any emergencies in the Thunderous Sound Mountain.

Moreover, out of the instinct of a lunatic bomber, he had also carried 50 Thunder Palms that were specially designed to work with crystal suits, as well as 10 Hellfire-Lightnings.

Ever since he killed that low-level demon general with a Hellfire-Lightning in the battle of Verdant Tarn City, Li Yao had developed a ‘bad’ habit. He couldn’t enjoy his food or sleep tight at night without several Hellfire-Lightnings in his pocket during real battles.

“Come on, jerks. Let’s do this.”

Li Yao sneered. He scanned every plant in the forest looking for the perfect spot for an ambush while he was on the run.

Soon, he stopped at a place where there were more Thunder Echo Woods than any other place that he’d come by.

“Shua!”

A shivering Iron Anteater hiding in a tree hollow was dragged out.

This demon beast looked like a small-size boar with an extremely long nose. It lived on the Iron Ants in the tree holes and had an amazing speed.

“Puff!”

Li Yao pierced his saber into the bottom of the Iron Anteater.

The demon beast’s long nose turned rigid and purple, and it started whining.

Li Yao took out a crystal box which used to be the container of the crystal railgun. He pressed it hard, and the shell of the crystal box was cracked. Then he tied the box to the back of the Iron Anteater.

Spurred by the pain from its bottom, the Iron Anteater fled deep into the forest the moment it was relieved to the ground, leaving a trace of blood and spiritual waves.

Li Yao glanced through trees, branches and bushes and drafted a deadly trap in his brain.

Ten minutes later, the two demon generals appeared from the darkness quietly.

They’d never expected that their prey would suddenly go backwards. However, there was no frustration in their eyes, but excitement, as if they had discovered an interesting toy.

Blood Hand sniffed. “He went to the left. I can sense the scent of blood vaguely, as well as some distant spiritual waves.”

Night Owl blinked his dimly yellow eyes and shook his feathers. He remarked,

“That can’t be right. This human being, although weak, is very shrewd. He got away from our perception just now, and it doesn’t make sense that he exposes himself so easily right now. The scent of blood is superfluous, too. He is in a crystal suit, why on earth would he be bleeding?”

Blood Hand nodded. He squinted and sniffed more carefully. Then he concluded, “It’s not human blood.”

Night Owl grinned frighteningly.

“That means this human being wanted to give us a wrong impression that he was fleeing into the forest in this direction. But he should be aware that the ruse wouldn’t fool us long and we would catch up with him eventually.

“Therefore, it’s quite possible that his true purpose is not to run away, but to set up traps on this route and kill us.”

The two demon generals looked at each other and sped up to the direction where the Iran Anteater had fled.

Passing by a place where the Thunder Echo Woods were extremely dense, Blood Hand smelled something and twisted his body weirdly to the above of a Thunder Echo Wood. He roared, “This is the place!”

Night Owl screamed and came to a halt. He shook his arms, unleashing almost a hundred grey feathers from his body, which flew into the woods like bullets.

“BOOM!”

“BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!”

The twenty Thunder-Palms deployed in the woods were triggered by the feathers and exploded at the same time. They melted into a giant fire ball and floated to the sky. The ball then was torn into pieces by the electric net over the forest.

At the same time, a scarlet figure dashed out of branches and ran away, only to be caught up with by the two demon generals who had been long prepared for his appearance.

It was exactly Li Yao!

Blood Hand howled horrifyingly. The red fur on his paws stood up like venomous iron needles. With a strong scent of demonic energy, he punched the back of the Bloody Blade Battlesuit hard.

The demonic energy, flowing through the needle-like furs, pierced Li Yao’s spiritual shield and left deep traces on the battlesuit.

Night Owl shrieked, too. His dim eyes suddenly turned brighter than ever with a freezing coldness, which directly launched a soul attack penetrating through the crystal suit.

The prey in the Bloody Blade Battlesuit seemed to have been overwhelmed by terror from the soul attack and couldn’t defend Blood Hand’s attacks. In less than 10 seconds, the crystal suit was already on the verge of falling into pieces.

“Swoosh!”

The prey seemed to be too scared to fight anymore and started running away in desperation, only to leave his back wide open for the two demon generals.

Blood Hand and Night Owl both grinned and sprinted.

However, right before their paws were able to push into the back of the Bloody Blade Battlesuit, the ancient crystal suit accelerated and miraculously dodged the deadly attacks with a perfect small-scale movement.

Blood Hand, Night Owl and Li Yao landed simultaneously.

It was not until they reached the ground that the two demon generals discovered that they had fallen into a swamp.

The swamp had used to be a muddy area and only became a temporary swamp due to the pouring rain. It had the same appearance as the ground nearby. One could never tell that it was a swamp without careful examination.

And as it happened, their prey was outside of the swamp.

Such a small swamp was far from enough to trap two demon generals. The best thing it could do was to delay them for about a second.

But during the one second when they were stuck in the swamp—

“Ahhhhhh!”

Night Owl wailed and jumped out of the swamp up into the sky!

Blood Hand was slower than him. He didn’t notice anything wrong until the volcano eruption in the swamp took place. His eyes were blinking in fear, but it was already too late.

“BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!”

This was Li Yao’s real trap. He deployed thirty Thunder-Palms plus five Hellfire-Lightnings in the bottom of the swamp.

The ferocious spiritual energy surged in spasm and swallowed Blood Hand in a dazzling light ball.

The power of crystal bombs could be maximized in a swamp because of the limited space. Sturdy as Blood Hand may be, the bottom half of his body had been shattered and the upper half tossed away by the blast before falling to the ground. There was no indication of vital signs on him anymore.

Night Owl’s legs were damaged, too.

But he had detected the danger faster and flown to the sky. Also, legs were not that important to him since he was a bird-type demon. He was ready to tear the sordid Refinement Stage Cultivator into pieces.

“Pa!

“Pa! Pa! Pa! Pa!”

Right then, countless flash bangs with blaze rune arrays on them exploded among the branches around Night Owl, illuminating the place as if it were a bright day.

Night Owl’s big yellow eyes turned grey like light bulbs that just cracked.

“BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!”

The portable Shattered Star Bombarder on the Bloody Blade Battlesuit fired dozens of heat streams instantly.

Night Owl roared. Although he couldn’t see anything, he dodged the heat streams flexibly like a ghost and moved higher and higher.

“Wicked human! Don’t count on that crystal railgun of yours too much!

“Once my vision is restored, I will tear you apart! I will—”

Before he could finish his word—

“BOOM! CRACK!”

A lightning split the sky and thundered down. The Thunder Echo Woods reverberated and a brilliant electric net was formed.

Unconscious of his whereabouts, Night Owl stopped on a branch of the woods, which happened to be the center of the electric net.

Night Owl was electrocuted.

This was Li Yao’s true purpose.

Use flash bangs to blind the demon general temporarily, fire the crystal railgun to disturb his senses of spiritual energy, then lure him to a higher place among the branches.

This way, even if he wasn’t killed immediately, he would’ve been shocked by the electricity, and Li Yao would’ve seized the opportunity and performed the Thunderous Tornado Saber Art on him to cut him into pieces.

But Li Yao didn’t need to act anymore since he’d died from electrocution instantly.

Chapter 254: Strong Desire to Survive

“Pa da!”

The fried carcass hit the ground and broke into pieces.

Li Yao walked to the dying wolf demon calmly.

The lower half of the wolf demon’s body had been already shattered by the explosion in the swamp. He leaned the upper half of his body against a tree, shaking in great pain.

Never did he expect that two demon generals would be killed by a Refinement Stage Cultivator!

“You’re dead for sure!

“Young Master Wang Ji won’t let you go, wretched monkey!

“Young Master Wang Ji will kill you and all your companions after he tames the mutant lion dragon!”

Knowing that death was drawing near, the wolf demon declared in anguish.

Li Yao said nothing and stood ten meters away from the wolf demon. He fired the Shattered Star Bombarder nonstop, raining shells upon him.

“Shua!”

The fur on Blood Hand’s body stood up. Together with a thin shield formed by the remaining half of his battle armor, he was able to hold back the first few attacks.

A moment later, the shield exploded. The cannonballs reached him unstoppably and blew him into the trunk. After dozens of strikes, the wolf demon was no more.

Li Yao found himself too tired to go on any longer. At first, he was on one knees. Then he leaned forward uncontrollably. He felt that his body did not belong to him anymore. There was no strength at all. Hundreds of crystal bombs seemed to have detonated in his brain, making him unable to think.

This battle was truly dangerous.

Although he’d successfully killed the two demon soldiers with a series of traps and power of thunder, he had paid a high price, too.

Attacks from demon generals were not that easy to defend. Demonic energy of the wolf demon’s strikes at the beginning had permeated into his body and caused inner injuries.

Had his body not been strengthened by the Thousand Tempering Hundred Refining technique, which made his defense ability much higher than common Refinement Stage Cultivators, his bones and organs would’ve already been broken into pieces.

The soul attack launched by the bird demon was also a hundred times more dangerous than the soul attack by the large-eyed ape in the Devil Flood Dragon Island.

Had his soul not been cleansed by Ou Yezi, whose remaining strength was protecting his brain, he would’ve become mentally deficient!

Although he won the battle in the end, he felt awful. An unknown fire seemed to be burning inside his body, making his mouth dry and his head dizzy. Deep down his throat, blood was trying to flood out one wave after another.

“No. I can’t stay here for long.”

Li Yao activated the healing rune arrays inside the crystal suit. A gentle green light flowed all over his body. Then he felt a prick on his spine, through which a lot of medical liquid was injected into his body.

Like a long-expected rain after a drought, the medical liquid was absorbed by his cells greedily.

Li Yao waited patiently.

As much as he wanted to rush off immediately, he had to wait for the medicines to suppress his injuries so that his combat ability could be partially restored.

Otherwise, there would be no chance that he could walk out of the Thunderous Sound Mountain alive.

Countless strong demon beasts were waiting to rip apart his crystal suit and devour him.

This place had the remaining scent of two demon generals. Common demon beasts wouldn’t dare to come close.

Ten minutes later, preliminary treatment was completed.

Li Yao’s brain was clearer. He struggled to rise up and checked the status of his crystal suit.

Thankfully, since he had always kept the critical parts of the crystal suit in mind, the wolf demon only managed to destroy the plug-in modules. Key components of the crystal suit were not affected.

However, some ancillary magical equipment had malfunctioned due to the corrosion of demonic energy and the intense impact.

“Young Master Wang Ji? He sounds like a big shot from the demon clan. Leading an infiltration squad to hunt a demon-king level wild beast in the Heaven’s Origin Sector, he must be really strong.

“I need to find an instructor as soon as possible. We may be able to intercept this infiltration squad.”

Despite the sharp pain, Li Yao didn’t dare to stay any longer and rushed to the outside of the forest in the healing mode.

Three hours later…

“Puff! Puff! Puff! Puff!”

Li Yao was breathing heavily after running for a long time. He felt his heart was going to burst out through the crystal suit at any time.

Shortly after he stood beside a Thunder Echo Wood and covered himself in camouflage with stealth rune arrays, a bunch of Inferno Fenrirs, whose tails were burning in purple flames, passed by and leaped into darkness with scary howls.

Li Yao knew it was not good.

He had lost the way.

With the compass rune array inside his crystal processor, he could get out of the forest as long as he stuck to south.

However, the direction that the rune array guided was completely wrong, maybe because of the spiritual energy chaos under the extreme weather, or maybe because it had been interfered by the demonic energy in the previous fight.

Thunderous Sound Mountain was not a single mountain. It was the collective name for the hundreds of mountains that were very close to each other in the area.

While Li Yao thought he was coming close to the foot of the mountain, he was, in fact, moving towards the deep inside of the mountain and ended up in another highland.

There was no way to turn back now. Many strong demon beasts in the Thunderous Sound Mountain had got their eyes on him.

Under the pursuit of the demon beasts, he had absolutely no chance to change his direction. After getting rid of seven or eight waves of demon beasts, he was completely lost and arrived at the center of the Thunderous Sound Mountain where barely any human being had ever set foot in.

“These demon beasts have been stimulated by my blood and gone mad. They won’t let me go easily!”

After a two minutes rest, Li Yao started running desperately again.

His body was exhausted, but his head was clearer than ever, like a burning torch, although running of fuel, was brighter towards the end.

To avoid being followed by the demon beasts, he even took a risk by moving forward by leaping between the branches of the Thunder Echo Woods. The electric net was literally at his fingertips as he went on.

Right then—

“Ho!”

An earthshaking roar echoed on a peak far away, as if a thunder had brewed on the ground and hit the sky.

Thunder in the sky were eclipsed and went silent for over half a second.

Li Yao was so astounded that he almost fell off the branches. He scanned the source of the roar with his crystal camera immediately.

The place where he was at was in a relatively higher altitude. Therefore, he discovered without difficulty that on the top of the mountain over there, giant trees were falling and clusters of lights were colliding with earsplitting noises.

“It must be the infiltration squad of the demon clan led by Wang Ji and the mutant lion dragon.”

Bitterness grasped him. He didn’t expect them to be so close to himself.

A combat that involved demon-king level beasts was too intense for a Refinement Stage Cultivator such as himself to meddle in.

He only wanted to run away.

But he was in the middle of hundreds of mountains, all of which looked exactly the same in a long distance. It was still raining cats and dogs with thunders and lightning. There was no way to tell which direction was which direction.

There was nowhere to run even if he wanted to.

While he was hesitating about what to do next, he heard several wolf howls. Looking down, he found dozens of purple lanterns glimmering dimly in darkness.

“Shua! Shua! Shua! Shua!”

Several Inferno Fenrirs climbed up the tree at an amazing speed.

Deep inside the forest, many other demon beasts also sensed the scent of his blood and were coming close.

Having no place to hide or run away to anymore, Li Yao felt that the brutality in his blood had been triggered. He drew his crescent saber out of the sheath and went for the wolf pack.

Right then, lightning struck the ground, illuminating the electric net over the Thunder Sound Woods. With the terror of wind and thunder, Li Yao performed Thunderous Tornado Saber Art at its maximum capacity. Dozens of saber flashes slashed at the Inferno Fenrir.

Wind blowing, thunder echoing, rain pouring, crescent saber crushing flesh and bones… composed a battle hymn of destruction that played for a long time in the forest.

Li Yao didn’t know how many times he had waved his saber, nor did he know how many times the healing rune arrays had been activated, although the medical liquid was already running out.

He even lost track of time, like he was back to the day when he was trapped by the dust storms, when his soul was burning crazily and his saber art was advancing remarkably, and when he was determined that he could slash anything in front of him into pieces.

Suddenly, there was nothing in his surroundings anymore. He had killed all the demon beasts around him, leaving a bunch of scattered, dead bodies.

But not very far away, another batch of demon beasts were closing in fast.

Li Yao turned around and start running without hesitation.

Hundreds of demon beasts that were after him gathered into a furious tide, ready to drown him.

The distance between them was shorter and shorter. Li Yao could even smell the foul stink of many of the demon beasts.

His spiritual energy had been brought to maximum. If it continued to be consumed at such a crazy rate, he might be able to avoid the fate of ending up in the stomach of a demon beast, but his brain would surely be burned to ash due to being overloaded.

Li Yao had never felt so close to death before.

“Argh!”

A pure white leopard, with purple electric arcs between its paws, jumped at him and tumbled down the hill with him, only to be stabbed in the heart in the end.

Li Yao coughed. Blood swelled in Li Yao’s throat, but he managed to force it back.

The blood was so sweet that it was almost bitter.

On the brink of death, for some reason, he thought of Ding Lingdang.

“I wonder what Sister Ling is doing right now. Training crazily, I suppose.

“I shouldn’t have just left a selfie for her that day. There was so much more that I should’ve said but didn’t.

“But, what should I say to her?”

The thought floated round in his mind for a while, but soon it was replaced by a strong desire to survive. Li Yao struggled to rise up and kicked the body of the leopard away. After a flash of saber, it was cut into two halves!

“The ‘Vulture’ is not going to be killed so easily!

“Whoever feels that he has lived long enough, be it the so-called Young Master Wang Ji or beasts like you, come on now!”

Right then, Li Yao noticed that a vague rainbow laser flashed in a hill and vanished into underground.

“Underground?”

Li Yao felt that he was onto something. He rushed to the place where the rainbow laser disappeared.

As he expected, there was an unobtrusive crevice on the back of a rock covered by green moss.

“Shua!”

Li Yao gritted his teeth and went into the crevice.

Chapter 255: The Soul Stealer and the Lion Dragon Demon

The inside of the crevice was like a world of its own. It was a huge underground karst cave, full of winding passages and endless darkness; God only knows where they led to.

The cave was terribly cold, the water that was supposed to be dripping down the stalactites over his head was even frozen. In the surroundings, there were grayish vines that were squirming strangely, as if a den of snakes was dancing.

As soon as Li Yao drilled his way into the cave, he activated the stealth mode, thereby restricting his spiritual energy as much as possible. At the same time, he also covered himself up with a camouflage net and clung close to the cave walls, letting the vines wrapped around him.

BANG! BANG!

After a moment, from the entrance of the cave came the thunderous sounds of beasts ramming into the cave, closely followed by an obnoxious smell that was capable of driving someone crazy. Whereupon, over a hundred demon beasts, squeezed their way into the cave!

In the darkness, the hundred or so demon beasts’ eyes were particularly bright and scary.

The demon beasts seemed to understand that Li Yao was at the end of the rope and couldn’t escape. Therefore, they were in no hurry to catch their prey. They sharpened their claws and fangs as they searched the cave inch by inch. Their eyes were filled with a bit of ragging and playful intent.

Nevertheless, Li Yao remained completely still, his heart burning with anxiety. Just when the claws of an Inferno Wolf was about to come in contact with him, a disastrous bout of killing intent that could tear everything apart finally surged out from the depths of the cave before a raging rainbow gradually appeared in his peripheral vision.

The Mutant Lion Dragon took the stage once again!

Li Yao heaved a sigh of relief, but in the next moment, his heart once again started palpitating.

Under the siege of over a hundred demon beasts, he was doomed for sure. And now the reason he escaped to the underground was that he wanted to lure the third power, the Mutant Lion Dragon to disrupt the current scenario and strive for a slim chance of survival.

However, would the Mutant Lion Dragon really do as he wished and have a conflict with these demon beasts?

Perhaps, the Mutant Lion Dragon’s strength with his tyrannical would instantly kill these demon beasts, which numbered over a hundred, and then crush him to death like a little worm.

‘The wild demon beasts are extremely territorial, they will annihilate every intruder unless there is not too big of a gap between both sides’ strength!

‘And this Mutant Lion Dragon was seriously injured during the battle earlier. Its strength has decreased a lot. Otherwise, it would not have fled underground in a flurry!

‘As long as the difference between the strength of both sides hasn’t reached the point so that the situation can be turned around, the Mutant Lion Dragon may clash with the wild demon beasts!’

At this point, Li Yao was filled with anticipation.

Taking a cursory glance at the Mutant Lion Dragon, Li Yao discovered that the Mutant Lion Dragon was somewhat smaller than the time when he saw the Mutant Lion Dragon for the first time, its body was covered in bruises, wings riddled with thousands of holes, its bright and shiny tail was also a bit dimmer. It had no trace of a Demon King’s majesty.

Furthermore, there was also an extremely weird and devilish Kris[1] nailed right at the center of its forehead. The Kris kept on squirming as if it was a living thing, as if it was a small snake that wanted to drill into the brain of the Mutant Lion Dragon.

The strength of the Mutant Lion Dragon seemed to have been sealed by this Kris. Every time the Kris twisted, the Mutant Lion Dragon would feel a sharp heart-wrenching pain so that the Mutant Lion Dragon could not help but twitch continuously.

“Soul Stealer?”

Li You clucked his tongue secretly. The shape of this Kris, as well as the peculiar aura emanating from it, was somewhat similar to an evil weapon mentioned in the Hundred Smelting Clan records called ‘Soul Stealer’. Once it drilled into the Mutant Lion Dragon, it could quite possibly steal its soul, and thence, the Mutant Lion Dragon could only obediently follow the command of the Soul Stealer’s master.

“There is also an expert refiner in the demon clan!”

Under the attack of the Soul Stealer, the Mutant Lion Dragon was a lot weaker than Li Yao had imagined.

The Mutant Lion Dragon and the group of over a hundred wild demon beasts discovered each other at the same time.

At first, the wild demon beasts were shocked; their instinct was to turn around and flee immediately.

However, the extremely weak, unimposing manner of the Mutant Lion Dragon once again made them greatly confused. Soon after, they immediately discovered the peculiarity after looking carefully.

The wild demon beasts glanced at each other, their eyes flickering with fierce gleams, as they silently communicated with each other and came to a tacit understanding.

The Mutant Lion Dragon’s flesh had stronger demonic energy stored inside, then there was also the dragon blood, dragon marrow, demon core, all of which were incredibly rare heaven and earth treasures; far more precious and rare than the flesh of a Refinement Stage cultivator like Li Yao.

They weren’t hunting for Li Yao so that they could elevate their strength by devouring Li Yao. No, their strength would improve by bare minimum only, it was just to vent their anger, that’s all.

If they could drink the demon blood from the heart of Mutant Lion Dragon, or swallow the demon core, it would be greatly beneficial to them; just maybe, they could evolve as well.

In a flash, these wild demon beasts were halted between two choices, whether they should immediately retreat or put their lives on the line to launch an attack, try their luck.

ROAR!

While they were still making a decision, a colorful beam of light rushed into the horde of demon beasts before a claw exploded the brain of an Iron-Armored Mountain Pig, gauged its heart out and started chewing.

The Mutant Lion Dragon had taken the initiative to attack!

One could even say that these wild demon beasts had run out of luck. The Mutant Lion Dragon had been hunted by an infiltration squad of demon clan lead by Young Master Wang Ji for days and nights continuously. And as such, had amassed a lot of anger in its belly. At this time, the Mutant Lion Dragon was tyrannical to the extreme.

Furthermore, it had suffered grievous injuries, its strength had regressed, not to mention, the Soul Stealer had drilled into its forehead as well, sealing half of its power and corroding its soul; it was hurting so much that it hardly wished to live anymore.

Then, the wild demon beasts had simply delivered themselves into its jaws for it to have a delicious meal. As long as it could devour them one after another, some of its strength could be restored, allowing it to continue escaping or even launch a counterattack.

After all, the experts of the demon clan infiltration squad had also been injured by it. Their condition was no better than its own.

ROAR!

AOOOO!

HISS!

The wild demon beasts had gone mad completely!

All of them could see that the Mutant Lion Dragon wasn’t planning on letting them off. Although the Mutant Lion Dragon was displaying its might, it was only strong from outside, that’s all!

If they retreated, it would pick them off one by one!

However, they just might be able to acquire the demon blood and demon core if they fought!

Just as this thought flashed in wild demon beasts’ mind who were born just for fighting, their beast blood started to seethe just as if a raging fire had been lit in their bodies as they rushed forward!

TEAR!

A centipede that was thicker than a python was torn to pieces under the Mutant Lion Dragon’s claw before the centipede was ruthlessly thrown to the cave wall.

Nonetheless, just before it succumbed to death, the centipede sprayed a mass of yellow-brown mist that covered the eyes of the Mutant Lion Dragon.

CRACK!

A giant bear that was as majestic as a small hill and had its white fur at its chest form a ghost face diagram was ruthlessly hit by the Mutant Lion Dragon, breaking its bones into pieces.

But the giant bear’s paw also heavily landed upon the ears of Mutant Lion Dragon, bursting forth with a thunderous bang, so loud that Li Yao who was hiding not too far away trembled with fear, and a buzzing noise rang in his ear.

Li Yao had completely covered himself with a camouflage net; as the saying goes, something is better than nothing. However, whether it was Mutant Lion Beast or the wild demon beasts, if they wholeheartedly searched for him, he would be discovered for sure.

However, both sides were engrossed in a bloody battle. All they could think of consuming the flesh and blood of opposite side, where did they have the time to take care of a Refinement Stage cultivator shrimp like Li Yao?

Li Yao, with light steps and softest movements of his hands, pushed the vines apart and made his way towards the cave entrance, sticking close to the walls.

As Li Yao raised his head to look, he secretly groaned.

Originally, a few wild demon beasts were worried that he would escape, therefore, they had blocked the cave entrance tightly.

Li Yao was helpless; all he could do was obediently curl up in a corner of the cave.

While he was pulling back, the battle had taken a strange turn.

The Mutant Lion Dragon and the wild demon beasts were surprisingly well-matched; both sides had sustained great loses!

In the blink of an eye, half of the wild demon beasts had actually been massacred by the Mutant Lion Dragon.

However, the demonic energy circling around the Mutant Lion Dragon also appeared to be dwindling, as if it was being squashed by a mighty storm.

The Mutant Lion Dragon was covered in bruises, bleeding from numerous wounds. A lot of wounds were also being corroded by poison which continued to seep into its body.

The remaining wild demon beasts became even crazier; they lunged towards the Mutant Lion Dragon without an ounce of fear of death, only trying to tear off a chunk of Mutant Lion Dragon’s flesh.

‘The strength of Mutant Lion Dragon has already fallen to lower than a middle-rank Demon General, and continues to fall at that!

‘I’ve still got a chance!’ shouted Li Yao in his heart as he carefully observed the weak points of Mutant Lion Dragon, while quietly recalling the saber technique cast by the Golden Core powerhouse, Long Wenhui in his brain.

He only had one chance, and he only had one card left as well. He must grasp the opportunity!

Eventually…

The Mutant Lion Dragon had also caught up with the last remaining Inferno Fenrir and was just about to tear it to death.

The Mutant Lion Dragon’s strength had also fallen to unprecedented weakness, leaving it only at the level of a low-rank Demon General.

Whereas more than half of the Kris had penetrated its forehead as well, leaving only a bit of the handle outside. At first glance, it looked like a fiendish red dot.

The Mutant Lion Dragon’s strength, stamina, perception, demonic power, all fell to rock bottom.

Li Yao took a deep breath as his brain cell activity jumped to 180%!

230%!

280%!

331%!

Super perceptive state, activated!

In the blink of an eye, the Bloody Blade Battlesuit was adorned with a crimson cloak, emitting a dazzling bloody brilliance.

Immediately after, Li Yao jumped out from the camouflage net and charged at the extreme limit of his speed. Every part of the crystal suit was making crackling sounds as if the suit was under a tremendous strain and could explode at any minute.

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

Six bloody beams of light shot out of the crystal railgun, flying straight towards the vital points of the Mutant Lion Dragon. At the same time, the saber cut through the air!

Immediately after, a white fog silently bloomed in the cave. After a brief moment, the sound of saber cutting through the air rang out!

This strike had surprisingly transcended the speed of sound!

Even though the Mutant Lion Dragon’s strength had fallen to the level of a low-rank Demon General, the crystal railgun was unable to make the Mutant Lion Dragon pay heed to it. However, plunging towards the left side instinctively, the Mutant Lion Dragon landed right where Li Yao wanted; evidently, Li Yao had long calculated the position and angle accurately!

The saber strike which had been tearing through the air, thrust straight towards the heart of the Mutant Lion Dragon!

The entire scene felt as if the Mutant Lion Dragon was ruthlessly charging straight towards Li Yao’s piercing saber which had broken through the sound barrier!

PUFF!

The saber pierced right into Mutant Lion Dragon, tearing its heart directly!

The Mutant Lion Dragon’s eyes went wide. Just as it wanted to launch an attack, the Soul Stealer on its forehead drilled into its brain completely with a “whoosh”.

In the blink of an eye, the Mutant Lion Dragon was struck with a chill; standing completely still, transfixed.

Its soul was in a fierce struggle with the Soul Stealer for the control of its body.

Taking advantage of this opportunity, Li Yao pulled the saber out and back off.

After a moment, the Mutant Lion Dragon burst into howling in anger as it waved its claws madly, setting off winds that swept Li Yao before Li Yao was ruthlessly smashed into the cave wall.

Unfortunately, it was seriously injured; its strength had fallen, the wind was already like an arrow at the end of its flight.

Even then, this strike made Li Yao vomit blood and cracked his sternum, but it wasn’t fatal.

The Mutant Lion Dragon was like a drunk dancing, it wobbled in the cave for a few steps before finally falling to the ground.

The rainbow-like gloss in its eyes dimmed gradually before they turn completely gray.

“I killed a King-level demon?”

Li Yao felt dream-like euphoria.

First, the Mutant Lion Dragon had been seriously injured by the demon clan infiltration squad and its strength had regressed to the level of a Demon General.

Then it fought a bloody battle with over a hundred wild demon beasts, as a result of which, its body was laden with wounds, losing a lot of blood quickly, and its strength fell once again.

Furthermore, half of its demonic power was being used to deal with the Soul Stealer nailed to its forehead. Even before its death, it was struggling with the Soul Stealer to gain control of its body, and as such, was unable to complete its final attack.

Only due to various coincidences could Li Yao get off so easily even before meeting Young Master Wang Ji.

“I wonder when Young Master Wang Ji discovers that the King-level great demon he so anxiously wanted to tame had been killed by an insignificant Refinement Stage cultivator and all of this happened because of his own plans, won’t he go crazy?”

Li Yao pursed his lips as a smile crept across his lips.

Li Yao wasn’t some broad-minded Buddhist practitioner. Since that Young Master Wang Ji wanted his little life, he would not act all polite for sure; either Li Yao would die or Wang Ji would die, there was no other way!

“Killing the Mutant Lion Dragon was the first step, now I have to escape from the hands of Young Master Wang Ji’s infiltration squad!”

[1] A double-edged dagger with a wavy blade, like two serpents coiled around each other. You can look more about it at – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kris

Chapter 256: Hidden Dragon Bombards the Sky

Li Yao sat down and pondered calmly. Now that the infiltration squad led by young master Wang Ji had beaten a king-level demon beast into such serious injuries, it was clear that the squad had a king-level expert, too. Maybe there was more than one of them.

With himself heavily wounded and his crystal suit greatly damaged, there was no way that he could get rid of Wang Ji’s squad.

The Shattered Star Bombarder, after being fired hundreds of times, had used up all its spiritual energy. Besides a few smoke grenades and flash bangs, the only thing he had left were five Hellfire-Lightnings.

Hellfire-Lightnings were powerful, but they were far from enough to deal with middle-level demon generals or above. In front of a demon king, they would be as useless as firecrackers that children play with.

“What do I do?”

Li Yao glanced through every corner of the underground cave. Countless thoughts popped up in his head.

When his eyesight moved from the dead body of the mutant lion dragon to the darkness in the end of the cave, he suddenly came up with a risky plan.

Holding back the sharp pain, Li Yao jumped over to the body and took out a dagger from a pocket on his right leg, which was for the use of dissecting bodies and retrieving materials from them.

The most precious part inside a demon king’s body was the demon core.

Demon core, just like the golden core in the Core Formation Stage Cultivators, contained the essence of the demon king’s decades and even hundreds of years of Cultivation. It was invaluable.

Besides the demon core, as a descendant of dragon-type demon beasts, the mutant lion dragon had forbidden scales[1] in the back of its neck.

The forbidden scale was both pliable and tough. When it was used to carve rune arrays on, the performance of the rune arrays would be greatly enhanced. It was a perfect material for refining shields or plates, too.

The blood in the heart of the mutant lion dragon was the essence of its blood. It would take years of time before the lion dragon could form one drop of such blood.

One drop of such blood was the perfect nourishment for low-level Cultivators. Sometimes it could help them to overcome their barrier and advance their level immediately.

Li Yao waved his dagger and started working on the abdomen of the dead body without hesitation.

He had butchered countless demon beasts over the past month and gained much experience in retrieving useful materials from them. After searching for a while, he cut off a fist-size, grey stone from the end of the spine of the mutant lion dragon.

At first look, it looked like any other stones. But when Li Yao tried to spread his spiritual threads into the stone, he felt demonic energy as enormous as ocean inside it.

This was the demon core.

There was hesitation in Li Yao’s face for a while, which was replaced by determination a moment later.

Invaluable as the demon core may be, his own life was much more precious!

He got out of the Bloody Blade Battlesuit. Then, he took out the five remaining Hellfire-Lightnings and three flash bangs. After that, he tore the Shattered Star Bombarder off his crystal suit. In the end, his hands swung up and down and built a piece of strange magical equipment with the demon core of the mutant lion dragon at the center, the five Hellfire-Lightnings on the periphery, and the three flashbangs as triggers.

Cold sweat was dripping down Li Yao’s forehead. He put his self-made, strange magical equipment aside in the most gentle way possible.

Then, he fumbled along the spine of the mutant lion dragon with his dagger and found three forbidden scales which he chopped off immediately.

The heart of the demon beast was pulled out in the same way. He squeezed the heart with the secret technique of the Hundred Smelting Clan. Eight bright gold drops of blood flowed out from the deep inside of the heart and spun around the tip of the dagger.

Turning the dagger, Li Yao dropped the blood into a bottle that he had prepared.

He got in the crystal suit after storing the forbidden scales and the blood. Then, he expanded the incision on the abdomen of the mutant lion dragon, through which he stuffed the strange magical equipment inside its stomach while holding his breath. Later, he closed the incision and covered the mutant lion dragon with a few other dead bodies.

He was exhausted when everything was done, but it was not time to rest yet.

Biting the tip of his tongue hard, Li Yao walked towards the inside of the cave.

The cave was quite spacious. Deep crevices that led to who knows where were all over the place.

After more than ten turns, Li Yao finally reached the end of the cave.

There was no path in front of him anymore, but a small pond.

Li Yao jumped into the pond and waited in patience while staring at the star-like brightness over his head.

…

Almost at exactly the same moment when he jumped into the pond, the infiltration squad, which had been chasing the mutant lion dragon, appeared outside of the cave.

After the brutal battles, especially the desperate strikes from the mutant lion dragon when it sensed that there was nowhere to run, the squad was in a much poorer state than previously. Every demon had deep-to-bone wounds on them.

The two mysterious demons covered in black mist now had to reveal themselves due to lack of demonic energy.

The infiltration squad consisted of more than twenty demon generals and two demon kings, which could almost be called a splendid team.

However, their purpose was not to remove the mutant lion dragon, but to tame it. Therefore, they were not able to use their deadly moves on the demon beast for fear that it might be killed.

In comparison, the mutant lion dragon didn’t have such concerns. It resorted to all the brutal attacks it could when it went mad.

Therefore, although the infiltration was on the winning side, they paid high price.

Two demon generals had been torn apart by the mutant lion dragon. The two demon kings, who had been leading the charge, were seriously wounded and had fallen to the demon-general level temporarily.

However, the mutant lion dragon was much more wounded than they were, which had also been hit by the Soul Stealer.

It was a rat in the hole now and ready to be captured at any moment.

Young Master Wang Ji had never felt happier.

He couldn’t care less about the two demon kings’ injuries, because they were not his subordinates but his father’s. They were here only because his father asked them to help him in the mission, and they had been spying on him.

Once tamed and recruited, the mutant lion dragon would be his loyal war slave driven by his secret art.

“As an ignorant wild demon beast, it was already able to injure two demon kings by its combat instinct.

“After I tame it and teach it the methods of cultivation, maybe he will be able to advance into a middle-level demon king or even a high-level demon king.

“With a high-level demon king as my subordinate, I will be destined to beat all the other rivals and win the ‘prince’ title!”

The competition in the Blood Demon Sector was extremely fierce. Despite the royal blood in his veins, he would have to compete with his brothers to get the ‘prince’ title in order to become the ruler one day.

Adventure to the Heaven’s Origin Sector was a form of competition, too. Whoever brought the most valuable trophies back would be able to command thousands of strong demons.

The losers, on the other hand, would be more than miserable.

Wang Ji had already started picturing how he would torment his brothers who had been holding grudge against him after he returned to the Blood Demon Sector and assumed the title of prince with the mutant lion dragon.

Right then, an intense smell of blood found its way into Wang Ji’s nose, who was immediately alarmed.

Beside him, the snake demon, who had been heavily wounded, screamed, “Not good. The Soul Stealer is not responding.”

Wang Ji roared and cast his gold spear to the entrance of the underground cave in a yellow light, which blew the stone blocking the entrance into pieces.

“Get inside and check it out!”

Wang Ji’s voice sounded like that of a crazy man.

The demons crowded in, only to be shocked by the bloody scene before them.

When they saw the breathless mutant lion dragon lying in the middle of the cave, they felt that a bucket of cold water had been tossed upon their head.

The result of days of hunting at tremendous risk was that the mutant lion dragon died together with a bunch of wild demon beasts?

Every muscle on Wang Ji’s face was shivering in anger. His gold hair had exploded into burning fire. There seemed to be two crystal bombs in his hands that were going to burst out at any time.

“It’s not that simple. I sensed the scent of crystal railgun’s firing. Some of the heat stream from it are still wandering in this place,” the snake demon squinted and said coldly.

“The Refinement Stage worm!”

Wang Ji was grinding his teeth, “There’s been no news from Blood Hand and Night Owl. They must’ve been killed by this worm. Then he came to this place by accident and wrecked my excellent plan! Ba Zan, please use your secret art to find where this worm is. I’m going to cut him to pieces!”

“I can in five minutes.”

The snake demon explained, “I’ve used the secret art multiple times today, which consumed too much of my energy. Now that I’ve fallen into the level of demon general, I can’t use it as easily as before. I need five minutes of preparation.”

“Alright. Thanks for your trouble.”

Wang Ji’s face was gloomy. Then something occurred to him and he exclaimed, “Not good. The worm must’ve stolen the demon core, the forbidden scale and the blood in its heart. Go and check it out!”

Three demons rushed to the mutant lion dragon and pulled the dead bodies above it aside, which revealed the incision on the abdomen of the beast.

One of the demons split the incision on one of his knees.

All the rest demons, including Wang Ji and the two heavily wounded demon kings, drew near to get a closer look at what had been left inside.

Right then—

The two demon kings felt a strong sense of danger. They screamed and fled to the entrance of the cave in the fastest way they could.

For a moment, Wang Ji seemed to have smelled the scent of death, too. His reactions were slower than the two demon kings, but the gold armor on his body shined brightly and released a shadow in the form of a roaring lion out of his chest.

The rest of the demons didn’t know what was coming at all.

The magical equipment inside the mutant lion dragon’s stomach had been triggered!

Generally speaking, the demon core was an inert substance. Although it contained huge amount of demonic energy, its state was very stable, unless its master decided to bombard it with the soul. After all, demon beasts, unintelligent as they may be, wouldn’t put a bomb that was likely to explode at any time inside their stomach.

Therefore, Li Yao chose to set off the demon core with five Hellfire-Lightnings!

Guided by the magical equipment that he built up with the components of the Shattered Star Bombarder, more than ninety percent of the blast from the explosion of the Hellfire-Lightnings was transmitted to the demon core.

Like an extraordinary detonator, the Hellfire-Lightnings activated a chain reaction inside the demon core and unleashed an unstoppable, cataclysmic outbreak of demonic energy.

[1] Parts of the scales at the back of a dragon’s neck that will infuriate it whenever touched

Chapter 257: Super Pressure, Brand New Self!

“BOOM!”

A ball of lightning in seven colors swelled out of the cave and expanded crazily like a newborn sun. Its blast pushed forward, turning trees and flowers on its way into pure ash. An orange and red mushroom cloud rose up from the place of explosion.

The cloudy sky was ripped a giant hole by the burst of the demonic energy, exposing the stars that were hiding behind the clouds.

An explosion of the demon core was equal to the self-destruction of a demon king or a Core Formation Stage Cultivator. It was dreadful!

When the ball of lightning was on a rampage, three figures rushed out like three drowning rats, only to be blown away almost a hundred meters.

They were exactly Young Master Wang Ji and the two demon kings.

Other than them, the rest of the demons had all been killed on the spot!

The two demon kings had suffered a lot of injuries in the previous battles. With the earthshaking blast of the demon core explosion, new wounds had been added to their body. Their reactions and senses had fallen to rock bottom, and they were shouting in anger and anxiety.

As for the young master Wang Ji, the gold armor on him absorbed most of the blast and was broken into pieces, but his body, on the other hand, was not the least affected.

In Wang Ji’s face, there was…

Bewilderment! Fury! Insanity!

He never expected that a Refinement Stage Cultivator, which was nothing but a worm in his eyes, would have so many tricks!

Not only did the worm get away from two demon generals’ hunting, he also managed to set off the demon core before burying it inside the stomach of the mutant lion dragon insidiously!

Wang Ji felt that his heart was bleeding.

He could do without the mutant lion dragon. But the twenty demons were all his loyal subjects that he had gone through a terrible amount of trouble to recruit. He was counting on them to fight for the position of prince.

Now, all of them were gone. What did he have to compete with his atrocious brothers?

In the Heaven’s Origin Sector, the most common practice to deal with losers in a game of thrones was to let them invade heavily-guarded human towns leading a bunch of black-blood and bronze-blood demons.

The only outcome was, no doubt, death!

“I’m going to cut you into pieces! I’m going to find out who you are and cut you into pieces, one piece after another!”

In rage, Wang Ji didn’t forget who was guilty of all this.

But neither did he know that Li Yao was so bold to hide in the deep underground, near the catastrophic bomb he set up himself, instead of running away.

“We can’t stay here any longer. Let’s go now!”

The two demon kings were both in bad temper. The snake demon said, “Our levels have all hit rock bottom now. Even several Cultivators at the peak of the Refinement Stage will be enough the kill the three of us. Let’s head back to the Blood Demon Sector now!”

“Wang Ji!”

The other demon king, who looked like a giant meat ball with green fur, was furious too. He snapped at Wang Ji, “We’re very disappointed at your performance in your quest this time. You didn’t show the slightest hint of leadership. You allowed more than twenty demons to be fooled by a Refinement Stage worm! When we return to the Blood Demon Sector, we shall report exactly what has happened to the master. A great war of the two Sectors is coming soon. Your performance proved that you’re unqualified for the position of prince. When the war comes, you’ll lead the charge in the van!”

Wang Ji was silent. There was no telling what his mood was. After a moment, he said in regret, “Well said, my teachers. But right now, let’s figure out how to get out of the Heaven’s Origin Sector first. Our teleportation rune array is hundreds of kilometers away. We need to plan our route carefully to avoid the human hunters.”

The green-fur demon snorted. He turned around and discussed with the snake demon.

A moment later, both of them smelled a weird fragrance. Their head, although a bit dizzy, sensed an alert that something even more dangerous than the previous explosion was coming,

“Not good. We’ve been poisoned!”

Before the two demon kings were able to react, a bloody battle spear pierced through the green-fur demon’s chest!

“Shua!”

The snake demon retreated fast. His tail flipped up and shielded his chest, only to be chopped off within a moment by a shadow attack.

“Wang Ji, how dare you!”

The two demon kings were so shocked that their voices had changed.

Wang Ji laughed madly, his gold hair dancing in the air.

“With everything that’s happened, what’s there to be scared of?

“If I walk back with you and let you tell the truth, I’ll lose the opportunity to be the prince forever. When the war of the two sectors breaks out, I’ll be the cannon fodder leading the invasion!

“But now, your strength has been greatly undermined. I’m far stronger than either of you now.

“After I kill you and absorb your demon cores, I’ll find a place in the Blood Demon Sector to digest them, then I’ll tell my father that we come across a hunting team of five Core Formation Stage Cultivators and that you were killed by them despite your valor. Isn’t it much better than going home right now?

“What, you want to self-destruct? You can’t! You had already fallen to the level of demon general before you were poisoned. There’s no way that you can detonate your demon core now!

“Now, behave and let me absorb you, old fellas!”

The two heavily-wounded demons were almost choked. They looked at each other and ran to two opposite directions of the forest.

“Want to run away? Not so fast!”

In a hideous smile, Wang Ji looked back at the half-collapsed cave grimly. Gritting his teeth, Wang Ji swore, “Worm, you can’t get away, either. I’ll find you and cut you into pieces one day!”

…

Deep underground.

Li Yao was not aware that infighting was taking place a hundred meter above his head, because he was in peril himself.

The explosion of the demon core was so powerful that when it reached Li Yao’s shelter after countless turns, it was still rushing at him like a raging tide or a furious demon!

The pond that Li Yao had been hiding in was boiling.

He condensed whatever left of the spiritual energy in the Bloody Blade Battlesuit into a shield above his head, and he covered his face with the forbidden scales of the mutant lion dragon.

Still, it didn’t help!

In a moment, his skin dehisced and blood was streaming all over his body.

“If it goes on like this, I’ll be dead for sure in half a minute!”

The current situation was within Li Yao’s expectation. Only by hiding in this dead-for-sure place could he get away from the search of the infiltration squad.

“Pa!”

Li Yao opened the bottle that contained the blood in the heart of the lion dragon and drank all of it.

The blood in the heart of the demon beasts, despite the intensive spiritual energy, was not readily drinkable, because it contained a lot of impurities as well as demonic energy. One could only drink it carefully after multiple refining procedures.

If low-level Cultivators were to drink it without refining, they would either be blown into pieces because of the overwhelming power, or turn into a bloodthirsty killer because of the mental corruption.

Li Yao had no time to bother about any of that now. The blood of the mutant lion dragon was all he had to defend himself against the bulldozing of the demon core explosion now.

The blood slipped into his mouth. He felt he had drunk six hot coals, which was burning their way from his throat to his stomach where they exploded.

A string of demonic energy full of desire for killing and destruction flowed along his spine towards his brain.

“Art of the Swallowing Whale, activate!”

Li Yao almost grinded his teeth into pieces. With the Art of the Swallowing brought to maximum, his stomach turned into a steel millstone that squashed, disintegrated, and absorbed the blood of the lion dragon.

Inside his brain, the tree of memories left by Ou Yezi was glowing in brilliance and purged all the intrusive demonic energy.

On the surface of his body, his bones, strengthened by the Thousand Tempering Hundred Refining technique, was trying to withhold the magnificent blast.

Stomach!

Brain!

Body!

Li Yao was engaged in three battlefields simultaneously, which were equally dangerous. If he was defeated in any of them, this dark cave would be the place where his life ended.

In dizziness, Li Yao seemed to have returned to the dust storm where he was slashing his way forward among thunder and lightning.

His soul calmed down. With the sharp edge that once slayed a tornado, it roared more astoundingly than any thunders ever did.

After he didn’t know how long, everything became peaceful again.

Li Yao came back to himself from a lengthy nightmare and found that the pond had already evaporated. The only thing left was a clump of stinky mud on the bottom of the pond.

His body’s state… couldn’t have been better!

“The blood from the heart of the mutant lion dragon has been fully absorbed by me.

“To defend myself against the explosion, I have been performing the Thousand Tempering Hundred Refining technique all the time, which had brought my body sturdiness to a whole new level!

“And my Cultivation level…”

Li Yao felt that there was inexhaustible spiritual energy inside his body flowing through his veins and arteries.

He triggered a thought. Spiritual energy popped out from his pores and consolidated into two dark gold wings around his body.

Soaring Into Heaven in One Leap[1], his Soul Igniting Law, was enlightened by the imposing vibe when the king of eagles flew freely in the vast sky. Therefore, the presence of his spiritual energy was also in the form of wings.

Compared with before, the spiritual wings had added the majesty of the lion dragon. There was even a vague rainbow in the periphery of the wings, too.

Li Yao focused all his attention and started burning his soul. The spiritual wings were brighter and brighter, illuminating the dark cave as if it were in broad daylight.

“Such dominance! Such brightness!

“I advanced four levels to the 11th level of the Refinement Stage while my life was in peril. How could it be?

“I understand now! This is the end of the cave. When the blast of the explosion swallowed me, it pushed the blood of the lion dragon, which had nowhere to run, into my own flesh and blood like a pressure cooker.

“Common Cultivators can’t absorb the entire Heavenly Material and Earthly Treasure even if they find one. The best they can do will be sixty or seventy percent, which is decided by their body’s limit.

“However, I managed to absorb a hundred percent of the blood of the lion dragon. Not only did it help me reach the 11th level of the Refinement Stage, my future training will benefit a lot from it, too!” Li Yao yelled in great satisfaction and happiness.

The 11th level meant that he belonged to the high level of the Refinement Stage now, which was completely different from the levels equal to or below the 10th level.

Many Cultivators had spent their entire lives circling around in the middle level of the Refinement Stage and couldn’t break through the barrier to a higher altitude, however thin the barrier seemed to be.

With the capability of the high-level of the Refinement Stage and the enhancement of a well-chosen crystal suit, he could fight several generals face to face without resorting to traps now.

[1] See c.153 for more information about this technique

Chapter 258: Home with Windfalls

The Bloody Blade Battlesuit was completely ruined. Its crystal processor had lost most of its functions, but the time module was working, which showed that a day and a night had passed.

“The infiltration squad must’ve left by now.”

Li Yao pulled the crystal processor of the Bloody Blade Battlesuit out and packed it up with the three forbidden scales in what was left of his clothes. He picked up his crescent saber and scrambled out.

Very soon, he came across fallen rocks that blocked his way.

After he advanced to the 11th level of the Refinement Stage, Li Yao’s senses became much more acute than before. He unleashed hundreds of spiritual threads which found their way into the crevices of the rocks. The feedback indicated that the blockage was not thick and it was empty outside without any sign of the demons.

Li Yao pressed both of his hands against the rocks. Taking a deep breath, Li Yao jerked and pushed them. It looked like a spiritual eagle with lion paws and dragon tail flew out of his body, which razed everything in its way. An corridor was immediately created.

“This is the strength of the high level of the Refinement Stage? Nice!”

Li Yao jumped out of the dust and reached the center of the cave.

“The power of the explosion is indeed formidable.”

Watching the messed-up cave that was beyond all recognition, Li Yao was startled.

There was an intense scent of blood in the air. The demons had all been blown into pieces and melted into rocks. Many of them were deprived of their pretension, revealing their true selves which were ghastly demon beasts.

“So many valuable trophies!”

Li Yao’s heart was beating fast. There was greed in his eyes.

Among the remnants of the demon beasts, he didn’t sense the existence of the demon kings, neither did he know whether or not the young master, Wang Ji, had been killed.

But why did they leave the bodies of their companions to rot in open air instead of burying them?

They were demon generals from the Blood Demon Sector, elite warriors of the demon civilization. Their bones, essence, and scales were of much higher quality than those of the wild demon beasts. Some of them even carried magical equipment of the Blood Demon Sector, which, although mostly damaged, was still very valuable in Li Yao’s eyes.

“Huh?”

Li Yao’s eyebrows twisted a bit, because he felt an eccentric scent from under the piles of rocks. He dug down and found a snake-shape dagger with crooked runes that looked like a distorted ghost face, which was blood-freezing at first glance.

“A Soul Stealer!”

Li Yao was dazed for a moment. He knew that something must’ve happened to the infiltration squad, otherwise there was no way that they would abandon magical equipment as precious as a Soul Stealer.

The Soul Stealer had been covered by a layer of dust due to the explosion. There were several cracks on it from which black smoke was popping up.

However, Li Yao didn’t dare to underestimate it. He bit the tip of his tongue and spit the blood out into a mist. Waving his right hand through the mist in a particular posture, he guided the blood mist into the Soul Stealer.

A crimson light dashed from his fingers to the Soul Stealer.

What he had just performed was the unique probe technique of the Hundred Smelting Clan for taking over magical equipment.

For evil magical equipment such as the Soul Stealer, it was possible that its master had set security constraints on it. If one touched it without preparation, they might be devoured by the magical equipment. It would be best to run a test first.

But there was nothing abnormal about the crimson light after it flowed around the Soul Stealer for an entire circle; there was not even the slightest reaction of spiritual energy.

“It means that the former master of the Soul Stealer has died. It is currently unowned.

“Weird. The master of the Soul Stealer can only be either Wang Ji or the demon kings. None of them are likely to have been killed by the blast.”

Li Yao put the Soul Stealer into his pocket and decided to study how to refine it after he returned.

Turning back, he found it troublesome to deal with the twenty demon bodies.

“There are so many precious items here. How can I take them all?”

After pondering for a while, he decided to check the situation outside the cave first. Maybe he could knit some ropes with the fiber from the demonic plants and weave a large baggage with beast hide.

His loading capability was amazing anyway. If he couldn’t take all of them, he could always pick out the more precious ones.

Li Yao crawled out of the cave carefully.

It was a peaceful night outside with a bright moon and few stars, as if the thunderstorm yesterday were just a nightmare.

The time of rendezvous had long passed. It was possible that Mao Feng and the other instructors had started searching. But since he was deep inside the Thunder Sound Mountain, the spiritual signals were blocked by the mountains.

Li Yao tried a few times. There was nothing but background noise in the communication channel. He still couldn’t contact the outside world.

Right then, he smelled a thin scent of demonic energy, which caused goosebumps all over his body.

After searching carefully for 10 minutes, he found a snake tail at the turn of a stream.

“It’s just a small tail, and it already contained so much demonic energy. Maybe it belonged to a king-level demon. How on earth did it end up here?”

He weighed it in his hand and felt something wrong. Scrutinizing the tail, Li Yao soon discovered the reason.

After tearing off a layer of scales, Li Yao found a black iron ring gripping the flesh of the tail.

The iron ring seemed plain and was deeply embedded in the snake tail.

“Why would a demon king wear you for decades if you are an ordinary ring?”

Li Yao sneered. He dug the ring out of the tail with his dagger.

Since the flesh of the tail had already shrunk after it was cut off from the body, Li Yao separated the iron ring without much trouble.

Li Yao spit out another blood mist to test the iron ring and found it as irresponsive to spiritual energy as the Soul Stealer. Relieved, he held it in his hands to further investigate.

A moment later, Li Yao’s eyes were sparkling in amazement.

He put the ring between two giant stones, pushed the stones into the stream and started rubbing them.

The stream turned dirty with bubbles popping up as if it was boiling.

Three minutes later, he raised the iron ring and aimed it at the moon. In moonlight, the iron ring looked like jade, spreading a mysterious aura, like a frozen ocean or a vast universe.

“Cosmos Ring! It is a Cosmos Ring!”

Li Yao felt he was going to pass out in happiness. There was indeed a silver lining behind each cloud. He’d got a treasure!

Cosmos Rings, together with Mustard Seed Bags, Object Containers, and Space Rings were all common storage magical equipment in the ancient Cultivation world.

But the refining procedures for such magical equipment were extremely complex and involved many rare materials that had been used up after thousands of years of consumption.

Back in the era of the Star Ocean Imperium, the storage magical equipment had been far more precious than ordinary magical equipment.

Right now in the Heaven’s Origin Sector, all the storage magical equipment were all smuggled or exported from elsewhere by accident, since the technology for refining it had been lost after generations. Its value was too high for someone like Li Yao to afford.

A piece of storage magical equipment that contained a space of several cubic meters was more expensive than a common crystal suit.

Li Yao had never expected that he would own a Cosmos Ring even in his wildest dream.

“The Cosmos Ring looked dignified. The spiritual energy in it is not aggressive, but the runes carved on it do not lack the scent of killing and blood either. Judging from its style, it should be a piece of magical equipment refined in the era of the Star Ocean Imperium.

“At some point thousands of years later, a snake king grabbed it and wore it on its tail. But his tail was cut off and he was killed, allowing me to take all the benefits.”

Li Yao’s heart was beating like a drum. He sneaked back to the underground cave and sat cross-legged, with the Cosmos Ring in front of him.

Then, he rubbed his fingers and squeezed ten drops of blood from the tips of his finger.

As the saying goes, fingers are connected to the heart. There was spirituality in the fingertip blood of the Cultivators that was only inferior to the blood in their heart.

The blood from Li Yao’s fingertip was transformed into ten long and narrow strings which tied the Cosmos Ring and penetrated in.

He was offering sacrifice to the Cosmos Ring by the ancient technique of the Hundred Smelting Clan.

Unlike evil equipment such as the Soul Stealer, the Cosmos Ring was peaceful in nature and utterly devoid of aggressiveness. As a product of the Star Ocean Imperium, its former owners had been mostly human beings. Therefore, it didn’t reject Li Yao as its new master.

An hour later, Li Yao had basically gained control over the Cosmos Ring. He could see the operation menu of the ring in his brain right now.

The Cosmos Ring was divided into two zones by its former owner. One of them was sealed by a secret art, making it impossible to detect what was contained inside, let alone retrieving the items inside.

The other zone was empty, with a space of more than ten cubic meters.

“The space is enough for me right now. As for the sealed zone, I’ll attack it with the most advanced, large-scale crystal processor after I return to the Grand Desolate War Institution. Such a small seal will be decrypted in no time!”

Li Yao was satisfied. Then he used the processing technique of the Hundred Smelting Clan to make the ring look even duller than previously, before he put the ring on his finger in relief.

Over the next day and night, Li Yao searched the cave carefully and stored the magical equipment and materials that the demons carried into the Cosmos Ring.

He was also surprised to find a lot of bones and paws of the mutant lion dragon, which were tough enough to survive the demon core explosion without being damaged at all. They would be perfect as raw materials to refine attack magical equipment.

Five days later, Li Yao was striding through the Thunderous Sound Mountain.

Since the weather was clear, he could distinguish directions by the location of the sun.

He had the crescent saber in hand, a demon beast detector in his ear, the crystal processor of the crystal suit behind his back and three forbidden scales in front of his chest.

The rest of the stuff had all been placed in the Cosmos Ring.

When he met a small number of demon beasts, he would slay them as training.

When he met a large number of demon beasts, he would took out the demon bones and demon core from the Cosmos Ring, which often immediately scared the beasts off.

Li Yao decided to keep what happened here a secret after much deliberation.

Not because he distrusted other people. It’s just that he would be unable to explain why he remained sober after over-drinking the blood of the mutant lion dragon instead of being mentally corrupted and turning into a killing machine.

If he were to explain everything, he might have to bring Ou Yezi up.

This was Li Yao’s biggest secret, which was also related to the source of his soul. He would rather no one know anything about it.

Since he was on foot and engaged in combat with demon beasts now and then, he was much slower than when he was in the crystal suit. It took three extra days before he walked out of the mountains and saw the splendid plateau again.

“Beep! Beep! Beep!”

Dozens of emergent calls crowded in the communication channel.

Li Yao turned back and looked at the dark and inky forest for one last time.

He had a feeling that Wang Ji was not dead yet.

“Next time we meet each other, it’s going to be me who does the hunting, Wang Ji!”

Chapter 259: Magnificent Era to Come

“I’m finally back!”

Three days later, looking at the Wild Waves City not far ahead, Li Yao sighed.

Although he didn’t get the title of ‘Thunder Exo’ at the end of the journey to the Thunder Training Camp, he had grasped enough knowledge about crystal suits to drive the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit in the future. Also, he made a great fortune in the Thunderous Sound Mountain. This trip was definitely worth every penny.

Li Yao was surprised when he got out of the train station.

In the square before the train station, besides Yuan Manqiu, there were some fifty young men carrying the burning gear flag of the Starfire Union, who painted a giant banner with the mystic ray that read,

“Welcome Home, Senior Brother of the Starfire Union!”

Li Yao noticed a few familiar faces in the crowd. They were the bad boys, including Li Sanhao, of the Empyrean Terminus Central High School.

“These bad boys have really been admitted by the Refining Department of the Grand Desolate War Institution?”

Since the competition between Li Yao with the I-type Tai’e crafting furnace and the refiner from the Empyrean Terminus Sect took place, students of the Empyrean Terminus Central High School had been impressed by Li Yao’s professional performance and they had kept in touch.

For the students who had better grades, their target was, of course, the Refining Department of Deep Sea University. But for the bad boys, of whom Li Sanhao was a good example, their GPA was far from enough to meet the requirement of the Deep Sea University. Therefore, they decided to give up the thought and come to seek the shelter of their ‘Senior Brother Li Yao’ instead.

Besides the bad boys stood distinctively another bunch of gloomy, indifferent young men who looked more like assassins than refiners.

Li Yao muttered something to himself. He had no idea who they were.

“Welcome home!”

In a big smile, Yuan Manqiu greeted him and gave him a bearhug. Li Yao felt that if he had not advanced many levels in the training camp, he would surely have been choked now.

“Senior Brother!”

“Senior Brother!”

The freshmen stood in two rows and started shouting.

The bad boys, led by Li Sanhao, and the gloomy ‘young assassins’ appeared to be competing. They were trying to shout louder than their counterpart, and even when they were out of breath with flushed faces, they were still looking at Li Yao with such obvious adoration that Li Yao felt the back of his neck was prickling. It was not until Yuan Manqiu explained to him that he finally understood everything.

The Refining Department successfully recruited two classes of students as planned. The bad boys from Empyrean Terminus Central High School made up a large part, but the majority of the new students came from Verdant Tarn City.

Verdant Tarn City was almost obliterated in the beast tide outbreak more than half a year ago, of which many parents of the freshmen were victims. Their studies and training had been severely affected because of the accident.

Therefore, the federal government had issued an act, allowing the students of the Verdant Tarn City taking the university entrance exam this year to be admitted at a lower score.

The students, especially those who lost their parents in the accident, naturally preferred the Grand Desolate War Institution, the local academy.

The Grand Desolate War Institution made a great contribution in the battle of the Verdant Tarn City. The performance of its staff and students left a deep impression on them, who hoped that they could become strong Cultivators in the Grand Desolate War Institution so that they could avenge their parents one day.

The number one goal for most of the students was the Combat Department.

But beyond everyone’s expectation, the Refining Department received the second most applications, which was even more than the Medical Department and the Liberal Arts Department did.

The reason was simple. Li Yao’s accomplishment was too brilliant in the battle of the Verdant Tarn City.

With ten Hellfire-Lightnings, Li Yao killed a preliminary-level demon general despite the fact that he was only at the middle level of the Refinement Stage. After details of the battle were revealed, many young men considered Li Yao to be their role model from whom they learnt the strength of magical equipment.

“If I go to the Combat Department, I don’t know how long it will take before I can break through the barrier of the Building Foundation Stage. Maybe it will take the rest of my life.

“But with strong magical equipment, even a Refinement Stage Cultivator can be capable enough to blow a demon general into pieces!”

For the young men who were desperate for revenge, joining the Refining Department might be a more direct and suitable path for their vengeance.

Li Yao’s recent achievements were more astonishing.

Although he didn’t receive the title of ‘Thunder Exo’, he did survive the three months’ training in the Thunder Training Camp. Moreover, he travelled for ten days far and deep inside of the Thunderous Sound Mountain in the Dark Desolate Domain and returned safe and sound.

Born and raised in the Grand Desolate Plateau, the young men knew exactly how intimidating the Dark Desolate Domain was. The fact that Li Yao could explore, fight, and cultivate in the place for ten days was evident enough that he was a man worthy of respect.

Therefore, before he returned, he had already become a legend among the freshmen.

Now that they’d seen him in person today, of course they would shout as loudly as they could to express their excitement.

During the hundred days, the Refining Department had undergone dramatic changes.

Not only had the students been recruited successfully, many teachers and researchers were in position as well.

The modification of the floating mountain for the refinement of crystal suits was finished a month in advance. It had been towed to the above of the Refining Department.

The Project Mystic Skeleton had been officially restarted. Many refiners had started working on it.

Supported by Xiong Baili, principal of the institution, Yuan Manqiu filed an application to the Refiners’ Association and the Ministry of Education, hoping that, in light of the special situation of the Refining Department of the Grand Desolate War Institution, the stipulation that there shall be at least one student passing the Refiners’ Registration Examination annually could be waived for the next three years.

After all, Li Yao had proved irrefutably the teaching quality of the Refining Department of the Grand Desolate War Institution to be excellent enough with his unparalleled performance. The staff had to focus on teaching for a few more years. It would be unreasonable to ask the freshmen to pass the Refiners’ Registration Examination every year.

The application was still pending approval. Xiong Baili was also taking part in the issue actively with his connections. It was unlikely that there would be a problem.

The shuttle that drove the students to the station was also upgraded. The wrecked, decrepit vehicle had been replaced by a sharp-lined, green, large-scale shuttle of the latest model that was as light as a dragonfly.

“This is just the beginning.”

Noticing Li Yao’s astonishment, Yuan Manqiu smiled, “This is just the beginning of the glory of the Refining Department of the Grand Desolate War Institution.”

When the dragonfly shuttle carried them back to the Refining Department, Li Yao almost failed to recognize the shambles where he had been training crazily for the past year.

Most of the ruins had been carefully cleaned. Useless garbage had been cleared, whereas useful magical equipment components were transferred to a few temporary warehouses where they were piled up neatly.

Surrounding the ruins, a few simple teaching buildings and dormitory buildings were under construction, many of which were half complete. A lot of semi-automatic construction magical equipment were floating around them. An impressive scene of rebirth from devastation.

In the sky, a delicate floating mountain was spinning silently. It was round and looked like a silver waterdrop.

The freshmen who came to greet Li Yao were dismissed. Yuan Manqiu brought him to the front of the silver waterdrop, which sucked them in with a mystic ray.

The designing purpose of this floating mountain was to refine crystal suits. Although it was not large in size, its layout was much more scientific than the previous one. Strong defense rune arrays and alarm systems were installed, which would send out warnings once they detected an abnormal spiritual tide.

Yuan Manqiu and Li Yao toured the floating mountain floor by floor.

Inside the spacious laboratories and refining workshops, a lot of refiners were focusing all their attention to the work at hand.

The white hair on their heads and the intense spiritual waves around their bodies, as well as the hundreds of magical equipment components flying in air at their disposal, suggested their seniority in the trade.

Li Yao even recognized a few faces that he had seen in the magical equipment magazines he used to read. They were all famous masters.

After a hundred days of insane training in the Thunder Training Camp, Li Yao was no longer a crystal suit newbie. It didn’t take much time before he realized that many refiners were making great progress in their research and the framework of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit was beginning to take shape.

He felt his blood was boiling and his hands were itchy. He couldn’t wait to join in with such an amazing team.

Seeing through what was on his mind, Yuan Manqiu handed over a jade slip.

“Li Yao, this is my formal invitation to ask you to join Project Mystic Skeleton as a researcher associate.

“I’ll give you a few research fields that you can work on. But your primary job is to explore all the possibilities in designing. There’s no need to worry about whether or not they can be implemented. The crazier, the better. We hope that you can broaden the horizon of the project team.

“After the crystal suit is refined, you’ll be in charge of the testing as its very first driver.

“Your name will be on the list of participants of the Project Mystic Skeleton. All the future revenues of the Project Mystic Skeleton will be shared by all participants in proportion to their contribution.

“The detailed progress of the project, possible research fields and the job contract are all in the jade slip. You can think it over before you make the decision.”

Holding back his excitement, Li Yao took the jade slip and shook his head.

“I don’t need to think it over. I accept it!

“However, the progress of the Project Mystic Skeleton is much faster than I expected. There are more researchers than we planned, aren’t there? Is our department rich enough to attract so many experts to this place now?”

Li Yao was a little confused.

Yuan Manqiu thought for a moment and said, “You have been secluded in the Thunder Training Camp for the past hundred days. It’s understandable that you are not familiar with the latest news outside. Over the past three months, a lot of things have happened. Come on, let’s go to my office and talk about it.

“In short, a magnificent era is coming!”

After an hour of chat with Yuan Manqiu, Li Yao finally understood everything now.

Three months ago, the capital market was the first to respond. The stock price of the sects that focused on combat or combat magical equipment refining soared. The medical board and spiritual beast board also experienced rapid growth.

Then, the federal government announced that the military budget for the next year will be increased by 50%, and that it would be increased by three times in three years.

The unprecedented military budget indicated that the giant war machine of the Star Glory Federation, after laying low for decades, was speeding up and ready to unleash ferocious power again.

After that, the federal government implemented a series of measures, including repairing underground fortresses, honoring the disabled veterans, promoting Cultivation techniques in schools and communities, and increasing the subsidies for the sects that worked on new models of war-related magical equipment.

A rising wind forebodes a coming storm. Even the most inert citizen could hear the footsteps of war drawing near.

In the Cultivation world, intelligence that the well-informed Cultivators gathered was much more appalling.

Chapter 260: Main Battlesuit Calls for Bids

Over the last decade, there had been more wormholes between the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector appearing in larger scales than any time before. Many parts of the sky that used to be very stable without any wormholes for hundreds of years had been ripped open, ushering terrible beast tides in.

According to the collaborative work of the research-type Cultivators from several major universities, the coverage of the Dark Desolate Domain had expanded by two thirds and there was no sign of stopping.

All the clues indicated that the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector were merging beyond the three-dimensional level.

Maybe one day, parts of the two worlds would overlap each other, which would shorten the long distance between the two civilizations to zero!

Demon civilization of the Blood Demon Sector might have long been aware of that. In the beast tide outbreaks over the last ten years, many demon kings and demon generals had been assigned to suicidal missions.

The demon civilization was trying to delve into the Heaven’s Origin Sector at any cost.

By sacrificing a few demon generals and demon kings, a lot of intelligence about human civilization had been collected.

Once the demon civilization gathered enough information, and the two worlds really started melding, an unprecedented war would break out, which would be the most large-scale collision of the two civilizations in the past five hundred years.

“The Heaven’s Origin Sector is entering a state of war. The military have undergone a paradigm shift regarding how the war should be fought. The crystal suit advocates are winning the warship advocates over. This is going to be our chance.”

Li Yao nodded.

In the military, and also among the Cultivators, debates had always remained unabated as to whether warships or crystal suits should be the main force in a war.

Crystal warships had obvious advantages. They had long attack range and fierce firepower. If they were faced with a large number of low-level demon beasts, it would be a one-sided slaughter.

Their disadvantages were clear as well. Their size was too large to be usable outside of specific situations. They could not cruise in the areas where spiritual fluctuations were intense such as the Dark Desolate Domain, they could not be transmitted through middle-size and small-size wormholes or teleportation rune arrays, and they could not drill into underground and fight the demon beasts in the mother lodes where resources were most abundant.

When confronting strong, high-level demons, they risked being infiltrated by the enemy. If the enemy was inside the warships, the defense of the warships would be reduced to minimum, turning them into flying coffins.

Therefore, many military leaders and Cultivators had changed their thought and believed that conquering the Blood Demon Sector would require face-to-face combat by Cultivators in crystal suits, instead of the cumbersome warships.

Since the crystal suit had more advocates than the warship did, most of the future military budget would go to the research and refinement of crystal suits.

Yuan Manqiu continued, “The military has notified the Nine Elite Universities and the top five hundred Cultivation sects that the army will purchase a model of crystal suit on a large scale in the coming three to five years. The research and refinement of this particular model will be put out to be outsourced and the Nine Elite Universities and the top five hundred Cultivation sects will bid for the qualification! Each university and sect can come up with their own design.

“We’ll have one year to prepare for that.

“In one year, the model that beats all the rivals in the competition will be fielded to the soldiers of the federal army and become the main equipment!”

Li Yao’s heart was beating fast. The news was amazing.

Since the foundation of the Star Glory Federation five hundred years ago, it had persevered with the strategy of homeland defense. Crystal warships were enough to deal with the beast tides. Crystal suits had never been mass-equipped.

Although some elite troops had been armed with crystal suits, the crystal suits they wore were of different models. There had been no uniform standard.

Right now, the military wanted a mass-produced crystal suit as the standard crystal suit for the army.

Everyone could see the value of the project. Whatever won the bid would undoubtedly be the king of crystal suits.

“However, why has the military decided to determine the model of the crystal suit this way instead of refining one themselves?” Li Yao mumbled.

“The reason is simple. The military and the Cultivation sects are the two wings of the federation. With a great war coming close, the two wings must cooperate in order to unleash the full power of the Star Glory Federation,” Yuan Manqiu explained.

Li Yao nodded in agreement.

The military and the Cultivation sects had always been in a subtle relationship.

Before the federation, it had been the era of sects. There was neither government nor military.

All human beings relied on the Cultivators in the sects to fight against the demon beasts.

Conflicts were brewing among the countless sects, which eventually turned against each other.

Also, many Cultivators considered themselves to be saviors of the world and lived an extravagant life by exploiting the ordinary people. The folks were not as supportive as before after suffering a lot.

Therefore, in light of the defects of the sect system, the Star Glory Federation adopted a series of hypercorrect policies during the time known as ‘Red Dragon Legion Era’.

During the thirty years of the Red Dragon Legion Era, the old sect system was smashed into pieces, and the power was highly centralized to the federal government. All the Cultivators were enlisted into the Red Dragon Legion and fought as soldiers of the army.

When the Red Dragon Legion was first established, it contributed a lot to the banishment of the demon clan with its amazing strength.

But as time went by, the main drawback of the new system, its rigidness, was revealed.

Creativity and epiphany were of paramount importance in Cultivation. A ‘eureka’ moment had been what all the Cultivators looked forward to.

Besides, due to their domineering strength, the Cultivators often preferred freedom to restraints. They might go wherever for training whenever they wanted to.

However, the top principle for soldiers was obedience. They didn’t need to think. All they needed to do was to play their part in the war machine.

When organized in the form of an army, the Cultivators immediately lost vitality.

The Cultivators who were willing to research new techniques or new magical equipment grew fewer and fewer. Many of them turned into submissive nerds who focused all the attention to the stern military training rules, which distorted their mind and transformed them into utter killing machines. Some even set on the path of devil Cultivators.

Just like that, thirty years after the Red Dragon Legion was established, its battle capability plunged. All kinds of riots were taking place in the legion. There were even cases where the entire troop turned into devil Cultivators.

The Cultivators who dwelled on the sect era were also conspiring to tear the Star Glory Federation apart.

Thankfully, the dark time finally passed without insurrection against the regime.

Based on the lessons learnt from the sect era and the Red Dragon Legion Era, the Star Glory Federation imposed a mixed system that combined characteristics of the two.

The military and the sects co-existed. The military represented stability, the sects represented creativity; the military had a large number of soldiers who had dominative strength in a battlefield, whereas the sects were famous for their advanced technology and magical equipment. With the checks and balances of the two sides, the world of Cultivation and the Star Glory Federation both witnessed peaceful and rapid growth.

At this time, the military’s outsourcing for the main force battlesuit was clearly a signal that even if a war were to break out, the time that the military controlled everything such as the Red Dragon Legion Era wouldn’t come back. All sects should rest assured and work together against the common foe.

Li Yao finally understood why so many more refiners had joined the Project Mystic Skeleton.

Yuan Manqiu said, “The Refining Department of the Grand Desolate War Institution has been working on crystal suits for mass-production since more than ten years ago. Although we haven’t make many achievements, we did have collected a lot of data and documents. Therefore, many experts decided to join us, especially those who believe in the grassroot ideologies.

“However, we have formidable competitors, too.

“The moment the military’s decision of outsourcing was announced, the universities and sects that had the ability all started their own mass-production crystal suit refinement projects.

“They may lack experience, but they have a long history of crystal suit refinement.

“Some sects are even refining low-cost crystal suits by simplifying the crystal suits that they already have. Naturally, their research speed is much faster.

“The Refining Department of Deep Sea University is working with the Golden Armor Sect for a new model of crystal suit for mass-production, too.

“The Golden Armor Sect ranks among the top twenty in the federation. It is the strongest sect in battle armor refining and has refined crystal suits independently before. Their work is best known for the sturdiness.

“Now, the best university and the best sect have formed a coalition. The billions-worth order is almost sure to fall into their hands. It’s indeed difficult for us to steal the food from a tiger’s mouth.

“However, if we want the ‘Holy Land for Refiners’ to refer to us and us alone, we have to win the competition!”

Li Yao clenched his hands. His voice was shaking in excitement.

“Professor, do you really believe that we can beat the Refining Department of Deep Sea University and take the title of ‘Holy Land for Refiners’?”

In a faint smile, Yuan Manqiu said, “I’ll tell you a secret, Li Yao.

“Ever since the day I went separate ways with Chu Xiuhong, my professor, and walked out of Deep Sea University, there hasn’t been a day going by over the past decades without me yearning to beat the Refining Department of Deep Sea University and assume their title ‘Holy Land for Refiners’!”

Li Yao gasped at the determination in her words.

Yuan Manqiu laughed and patted Li Yao on his shoulder. She continued, “Alright. You must be exhausted after your adventure to the Dark Desolate Domain. Take a decent rest before you get back to work again.

“Right, remember to check on your girlfriend, too. Days ago, when she heard you had went missing in the Thunderous Sound Mountain, she was jumping up and down in worry. She even decided to go to rescue you in the Dark Desolate Domain. Thankfully, President Xiong stopped her from doing that. What a silly girl.”

“Got it.”

Li Yao was so focused on the announcement of the military that he didn’t even realize what his professor was talking about. A moment later, his eyes grew wide as he said in bewilderment, “My girlfriend? Who’s my girlfriend?”

Yuan Manqiu glanced at him strangely.

“Isn’t Ms. Ding, who stayed at the institute after graduation, your girlfriend? You always go to and leave her place at midnight. Everybody in the faculty neighborhood knows that. I’ve even seen it with my own eyes a couple of times. Is there a problem?”

Chapter 261: Godlike Man

Li Yao’s cheeks were flushed in embarrassment. He faltered and failed to give an answer.

Yuan Manqiu misunderstood his awkwardness. She said in a comforting voice, “Students of the Grand Desolate War Institution are all grown-ups. The institution does not forbid students and teachers being in a relationship. Your situation is special, too. You’ve been more than qualified for graduation based on the facts that you passed the Refiners’ Registration Examination and the three months’ training in the Thunder Training Camp. Now, you are already a research associate of the institution. So, there is no need to worry about the code of conduct.”

“It’s not like that, professor.”

Li Yao tried to explain, vaguely, “Ding Lingdang and I are only training partners.”

After saying that, Li Yao felt somewhat both jealous and lost.

He was dazed. He didn’t understand why he felt that way.

Yuan Manqiu was surprised. She stared at him for a long time before she said, “Li Yao, I’ve read the report from the Thunder Training Camp which concluded your advantages and disadvantages that were observed during your three-month training. The Thunder Training Camp gave you a high score in every regard. There was only one shortcoming: you are too crazy about training.”

Li Yao didn’t understand, “What’s wrong with training crazily?”

Yuan Manqiu was quiet for some time. Then she continued, not without sadness, “Li Yao, do you know the one thing that I regret most in my entire life?

“One year ago, the night before what we thought would be the day of the Project Mystic Skeleton’s success, Old Mo told me that he made a reservation in a nice restaurant and he wanted us to go to dinner alone to celebrate it in advance.

“When the refinement of the super-compressed crystal reactor succeeded the next day, the entire Refining Department would definitely celebrate together in great joy. There wouldn’t be private space for us.

“However, I turned him down, because of an unimportant data assessment task.

“Over the years before that, we had fully devoted ourselves to the Project Mystic Skeleton like two fanatics. We barely expressed our feelings to each other. Our meals were either eaten in the school cafeteria or were takeaways that a lot of people gathered together to eat. I could hardly remember when was the last time that Old Mo and I went out for a serious dinner.

“At that time, I always thought that it was not important. Training and research were what mattered most.

“Also, after the Project Mystic Skeleton succeeded, we would have the rest of our lives to share with each other.

“I was wrong.

“You know what happened the next day.

“I don’t regret that I left Deep Sea University; I don’t regret that I walked on the path of the grassroot refinement ideology. Even Old Mo’s accident by itself never shook my perseverance in Cultivation.

“But I deeply, deeply regret that I didn’t go out to dinner with him that night.

“Even if one day the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit is successfully refined and the Refining Department of the Grand Desolate War Institution becomes famous all over the world, I’ll never have the opportunity to talk with Old Mo about our sufferings in the past decades and share the happiness of success with each other at a dinner table anymore.”

Li Yao sniffed. He felt that something deep down his heart was touched.

Yuan Manqiu sighed and said solemnly, “Crazily training is good. Greatness cannot be achieved without obsession. How can you break the barrier of Cultivation without a bit of craziness? But bear in mind that the purpose of Cultivation is to become a genuine human being, instead of a training machine.

“Refinement, Building Foundation, Core Formation, Nascent Soul, Spirit Transformation… the path of Cultivation never ends.

“There are countless worlds in the boundless cosmos.

“But the precious things in your life are likely to be gone forever before you can appreciate them.

“And once they’re gone, you can’t find them again even if you become the best Cultivator in the entire universe.

“Remember, you are, first and foremost, a human being and then a Cultivator. Training is important, but it’s more important to be a human being first.

“Therefore, I want you to withdraw from your crazy training for a moment and examine the beautiful things in your life.

“Only after you’ve tasted the beauty of life can you face brutal battles valiantly; only after you found the things that you cherish most can you understand the true meaning of Cultivation.”

Li Yao bit his lips. He was breathing hard. His eyes beamed out two thin lights.

He felt his brain was in a mess.

Many memory pieces that looked like glittering glass surged in his brain and gathered into a giant smile, a smile so contagious that anyone who saw it would immediately start smiling, too.

Ding Lingdang…

Yuan Manqiu said seriously, “Ms. Ding’s mother was also a faculty member of the Grand Desolate War Institution. She was a colleague of mine for decades. Although our research fields were different, and we didn’t communicate a lot, I have been very familiar with her daughter ever since she was a little girl. Ms. Ding is a good girl. But her parents’ accident was too much for her. She has been somewhat stuck in the mire of Cultivation.

“For years, she has been a lunatic in training like yourself. There is nothing but training, training and training in her head.

“You are the first one to have ever disrupted her training and let her forget it temporarily.”

Li Yao opened his mouth, but he didn’t know what to say.

Yuan Manqiu glared.

“Don’t you dare say again that the purpose of you meeting each other alone at midnight is for training! Why don’t you come to me for training at midnight?”

Failing to come up with any rebuttal, Li Yao shut his mouth.

Yuan Manqiu glanced at him and told him one last shocking message, “The day before you reached out to the outside world again, when everyone thought that you were dead, Ding Lingdang was the only one determined to go to search for you in the Dark Desolate Domain. She even cried in front of the principal.”

Li Yao’s head went blank. The world seemed to have turned into a giant cloud on which he was standing dizzily.

He jumped up and dashed out.

“I’m going to find her now!”

…

Li Yao was running through the campus.

It was a cool autumn day. Red leaves that looked like fire were everywhere on the ground, burning Li Yao’s feet and pushing him to be faster and faster.

Ding Lingdang and he were back in touch several days ago. But during their talk via the spiritual crane messenger, she was talking and laughing as usual and never mentioned anything about her rescue plan.

“Why didn’t she tell me?

“Did she really cry?”

Every moment since they first met each other popped up in Li Yao’s head. It was not until now that Li Yao realized he remembered everything so clearly, as if he had a crystal processor inside his body that recorded Ding Lingdang’s every smile.

Ba bump! Ba bump! Ba bump!

Li Yao’s heart was beating like drumming and his sweat was pouring from his forehead. He felt more anxious than when he was faced with the two demon general hunters.

Rushing all his way, and by a lift in the end, Li Yao finally arrived at the floating mountain of the Combat Department.

Yuan Manqiu told him that Ding Lingdang would be teaching the physical exercise class for the freshmen of the Combat Department.

Although there was still a long way head, Li Yao was already able to see Ding Lingdang dashing like wind and fire kicking dozens of freshmen down before she roared that they needed to do long-distance running while carrying plates of hundreds of kilograms.

Li Yao couldn’t help but smile.

She was just like the old days, a phoenix flying in fire that would never stop on the ground.

Li Yao sat cross-legged beside the playground, leaning on one of his elbows while waiting for the class to be over.

Or rather, he was waiting for the class not to be over. It felt good to watch her dancing cheerfully so far away.

Soon, Ding Lingdang noticed him and put on a big smile.

“Look over there!”

“Ms. Ding is smiling! So gently!”

“Are my eyes deceiving me? I never saw such an expression on Ms. Ding’s face before. What’s going on? Has she been possessed by a devil?”

The freshmen were all stupefied. Many of them, not realizing that their plates had fallen on their feet, didn’t even scream out in pain. The playground was caught in a weird vibe.

Their school had started only a few days ago, but they had all learned the toughness of Ding Lingdang already. Ms. Ding was truly a devil in training. Her crazy training methodology had put the most enthusiastic students in tears.

After consulting the sophomore students, they learnt more history about this human-shape tyrannosaurus.

Apart from everything else, the fact that she was the sole female president of the Iron Fist Club was evident enough of her resolution.

Never would they ever believe that Ding Lingdang had such a personality that could almost be called ‘sexy’, which fascinated all of them.

“Who’s this guy? He has an air of sharpness around him, like a wild beast that just came out of the forest!”

“He seems to be coming for Ms. Ding. Look! Ms. Ding’s eyesight has never been away from him for even a single second ever since he came here. Wow! She smiled again! Did you see that? A smile with so much femininity! Ms. Ding must’ve been put under a spell!”

“Ms. Ding walked to him. Ms. Ding opened her arms. Wow! They hugged! Hugging, not tugging!”

“Could he be the ‘Vulture’, Li Yao, the legendary strongest man of the new generation of the Grand Desolate War Institution?”

“That’s right. It must be him. But the reason why he is the well-acknowledged strongest man of the new generation is not because of his credits or his achievement in the Limit Challenge Competition, but, according to sources, because he is very likely to be Ms. Ding’s boyfriend!”

“What?”

Countless eyes gazed at Li Yao in admiration.

To think that he could tame a human-shaped tyrannosaurus! No wonder he was the new legend of the Grand Desolate War Institution! What a godlike man!

…

At night.

The roof of Ding Lingdang’s house was surrounded by bamboos. Lying on the roof, one would feel like sailing in a sea of bamboos with nature as the helmsman. It was quiet and peaceful.

Stars were dancing in the sky. Their brilliance gathered and formed a big smile.

Li Yao shook his head to get rid of the illusion. He rubbed his face hard.

Ding Lingdang came out through the skylight. She laughed when she saw Li Yao’s grimace, “What are you doing?”

Chapter 262: Tale of Time

For some reason, Li Yao felt guilty and didn’t dare to look at her in the eyes, fearing that she might see through the unsaid feelings in his heart.

“Why are you acting all weird? Not recovered from the protracted stay at Thunderous Sound Mountain yet?”

Ding Lingdang walked to Li Yao on the tips of her toes and lay down beside him. After stretching herself, she patted Li Yao on his back heavily as she said, “Good for you. Surviving ten days by yourself in the Thunderous Sound Mountain without being eaten by a demon beast. That’s my boy!

“Are you done resting? Let’s go down and start training if you are.

“During the three months while you were gone, I’ve been training by myself in the Billowing Star Sea. There was no one to practice boxing with. It was so boring that my bones were itchy, my meals were dull, and I couldn’t sleep well. Haha. If you were delayed for a few days longer, I might’ve gone to the Dark Desolate Domain to find you.”

Ding Lingdang said casually, showing no sign that she had cried in front of anyone.

Blinking his eyes, Li Yao said hesitatingly, “Sister Ling, why don’t we just sit and talk here while we enjoy the beautiful view instead of going to the Billowing Star Sea?”

“Huh?”

Ding Lingdang stared at him from head to toe for over half a minute, before she said in amusement, “That’s not something the ‘Vulture’ often says. I remember that we used to spend every second we’re together on training. Why are you changed after only three months?”

Li Yao scratched his hair. He smiled.

“I just thought that we never really had the chance to sit down and get to know each other although we’ve met for such a long time.”

Ding Lingdang’s mouth twitched.

“There isn’t so much time for chitchatting! We can get to know each other by our fists. My fist, for one, knows your body pretty well.”

She turned him down. But seeing Li Yao’s disappointed face, she felt her heart was somewhat hurt. She blurted, “Alright, alright. You are totally absent-minded today. It will be no fun beating you up. Might as well gossip for a while. What do you want to talk about? Martial arts or magical equipment?”

Li Yao almost laughed.

“Can we talk about something else? For example, like, your parents? I’m curious about how a refiner of the military and a university teacher fell in love with each other.”

Li Yao wanted to bite his tongue off the moment he let those words out.

There couldn’t possibly be a worse topic! Where was his computational ability that he was so proud of?

But since the Pandora’s box was already opened, Li Yao had no choice but to stare at Ding Lingdang waiting for an answer.

Li Yao felt sorry about the accident of Ding Lingdang’s parents. But he also knew that it would be better to dig out and deal with the emotional trauma than to bury it deep down in her heart for the rest of their life.

Ding Lingdang’s smile was frozen, before it melt half a minute later under Li Yao’s enthusiastic look.

She took a long breath. Memories of long time ago came back to her. Her lips curled as she thought of something interesting.

After a while, she smiled.

“They met each other during a co-operation of the Grand Desolate War Institution and the military. My mother and I share the same temper. Straightforward and aggressive. She liked to travel to the depths of the Grand Desolate Plateau and fight the demon beasts there.

“Men around her often found her unbearable.

“My father was a mild, somewhat mundane, man. He was a typical refiner dwelling in the world of magical equipment all the time who had zero combat ability.

“At the beginning of the co-operation, they came across a very strong demon beast. My father was almost killed because of his lack of combat skills. My mother saved his life multiple times from the paws and teeth of the demon beast. But as a result, their mission was delayed.

“My mother was mad and got even madder seeing my father’s dumb actions.

“Therefore, she went to my father whenever they were not occupied during the mission and taught him basic self-defense skills, in case he dragged the team down again.

“But according to my father, my mother was simply looking for more opportunities to pick on him.

“Anyways, that was how my mother and my father met. After the co-operation was over, my father came to the Grand Desolate War Institution for my mother whenever he had free time, claiming that he needed to learn more about the self-defense skills my mother taught him which he found extremely useful.

“My mother was innocent enough to believe that my father was really trying to learn the martial arts, so she taught him without being guarded against him. My father finally got a chance. Later, he even filed an application to the military to study martial arts in the Grand Desolate War Institution for half a year.

“Just like that, during the learning and teaching, my mother fell in love with my father as well. Haha!

“They loved each other very much. You’ve seen the two delicate puppets in my house, haven’t you?

“Those are my father’s masterpieces.

“Born in the Grand Desolate Plateau and serving in the military all the time, my father was kind of a grassroots refiner. He wasn’t good enough to refine such exquisite magical equipment.

“But he spent all his spare time polishing one crystal stone after another and refining one component after another. Finally, he created those two wonderful puppets as a gift to my mother on their tenth wedding anniversary.

“He said that my mother was the high and mighty seven-colored parrot and he would be the little snake staying by her side and protecting her.

“But my mother laughed and said that he was too weak to protect her and that he should just stay at home and let his wife protect him.”

No one had been bold enough to talk with Ding Lingdang about her parents.

She never had the opportunity to share their stories with other people either. Now that she started talking, she found herself hardly able to stop.

Lying with her head on her hands, she told Li Yao everything about her parents as stars shined warmly in the sky.

From the funny stories when her parents just fell in love, to the happy moments after she was born, and how her father taught her refining when she was just little girl.

Without her knowing, she was leaning close to Li Yao. Nor did she, who was excited by all the beautiful memories, notice Li Yao’s weird face.

After talking forever, Ding Lingdang finally stopped, when her body was right next to Li Yao’s. She licked her lips and said, “Hey, I’ve talked so much about myself. Don’t just listen. Say something about yourself, too. Let me see… Why don’t you tell me how you became a refiner?”

Li Yao was dazed for a moment. The warmth in his eyes dispersed and didn’t return until a while later. With a childish smile, he murmured, “When I was four or five, I was still struggling in the magical equipment graveyard.

“One day, I came across a Flying Music Box by accident.

“You know what a Flying Music Box is, don’t you? It’s like a little bamboo dragonfly that can float in the air and play beautiful music.

“The more advanced models could unleash a three-dimensional light beam that displayed music videos.

“To this day, I still remember clearly that the Flying Music Box I picked up could play four music clips with four different light beams, which were the sceneries of a peaceful forest in four seasons.

“Every night, I would listen to the music box and enjoy the seasonal change of the forest. That was my happiest moment in a day.

“At that time, I truly believed that there were gods in this world. Who else could create such amazing magical equipment other than gods?

“Later, I learnt that such magical equipment was crafted by ‘refiners’. That’s when I decided that I would be a refiner one day and make the best Flying Music Box in the world.”

Li Yao laughed vainly. “But after I became a refiner, I never once refined civil magical equipment such as a Flying Music Box. What I refined has been nothing but weapons for battles and combat.

“Under the guidance of my father, I did try to refine a Flying Music Box before. But it was ugly and had imbalanced wings, which caused it to fall every time it flew for a while.

Ding Lingdang leaned close. “I never knew that small talk could be so much fun. Let me see what else I’ve got for you…”

The two of them chatted and laughed, until stars over their head quenched one after another.

They both fell to sleep on the roof after they didn’t know how long.

Li Yao was made of flesh and bones like anybody else. Three months of over-training in the Thunder Training Camp and ten days on the run in the Thunderous Sound Mountain had drained him.

During the days after he was rescued, he found his brain too excited to sleep however his body tried to even when he was placed in a deep sleep capsule.

Right now, lying beside Ding Lingdang and smelling her perfume, Li Yao felt that the burden on his mind had been removed and fell asleep easily.

When he woke up again, broad daylight was already shining on his face. The autumn sun was comfortable and cozy.

Coldness of the night couldn’t do any harm to the Cultivators. Li Yao felt refreshed and vigorous as he could ever be. Even the world had become more beautiful in his eyes.

His left hand was numb. Then he realized that Ding Lingdang was taking his left arm as her pillow.

He swallowed and moved his hand.

Ding Lingdang seemed to have felt something. She frowned and crawled into Li Yao’s arms, like a kitty scrambling to a warm shelter in coldness.

She moaned and muttered something.

Li Yao’s heart was beating fast. He turned his ear to listen carefully, his earlobe almost kissing Ding Lingdang’s burning lips.

Ding Lingdang repeated what she just said. This time, Li Yao got it loud and clear. It was—

“Damn, you wusses. Faster! Faster! Run faster!”

Li Yao was stiffened.

With a shivering of her eyelashes, Ding Lingdang opened her eyes.

The dumb look on her face indicated that she was not fully awake yet. She stayed still for a long time, unwilling to get rid of the warmth around her.

It was not until half a minute later that her eyes went clear again. She jumped and stretched her arms. Then she combed her hair with her fingers, only to make it messier than before.

“Ho-hum.”

Ding Lingdang yawned comfortably. She was smacking her lips as she said, “That was a short night. It will be fun just chatting casually every once in a while. It’s officially decided then. Let’s spare one night for chitchatting every month, no, every fortnight, no, every week, what do you think?”

Chapter 263: Fiend Star Refining Workshop

“Works fine for me!”

Li Yao smiled. “But you haven’t answered the last question I asked you yesterday.”

“I haven’t?”

Ding Lingdang’s big eyes were blinking in confusion, “I forget it. What was the question again?”

“Your future plans. Like, what you will do in the future, what kind of boyfriend you’re looking for, etc.”

Li Yao’s eyes were unsteady.

“We talked about that last night? I don’t remember any of it.”

With puffy cheeks, Ding Lingdang thought for a while. Then she said, “About the future, I probably won’t be a college teacher forever.

“The reason I stayed at school after graduation was partly because of my mother, and partly because I wanted to learn some more stuff in the Grand Desolate War Institution so that I could be stronger and avenge my parents one day.

“However, after I truly became a teacher, I found the job completely unsuitable for me. The weak-ass freshmen really dispirit me. I don’t even have the passion to abuse them anymore.

“Maybe the free-hunting-in-wilderness lifestyle is more my cup of tea.

“One day, when I’m strong enough, I might become a demon beast hunter. It will be awesome, won’t it?”

“Well—”

Li Yao was actually more interested in the latter half of the question.

“As for boyfriend, I haven’t given it much thought. It doesn’t matter what I think anyway. You know my personality best. However hard I try to pretend to be an elegant lady, I’ll end up betraying myself within half a day. Any normal guy who sees me burping after eating five grilled gigots for a single meal will surely be scared off, won’t they?”

“I think so, yes. However, there are many guys that are not so normal in this world. Let’s just say there is an abnormal guy who can tolerate your quirks. What would you expect him to be like?”

Li Yao swallowed nervously.

“What kind of question is this?”

Ding Lingdang glanced at him in suspicion. She thought for a moment and replied, “First, he must be handsome. I love polite, gentle, handsome, scholarly-looking guys best!

“Second, he must be weak. Definitely not a battle-type Cultivator. Culture-type Cultivator and research-type Cultivator will be best.

“Third, he must listen to whatever I say, because I’m going to be the master of my family. Hahahaha!”

“Polite, gentle, handsome, scholarly-looking?”

Li Yao was dazed for a long time, “I thought you’d prefer tougher guys and your criteria would include things like ‘higher combat ability’ and ‘slaying a certain number of demon beasts’. Your requirements sounds a little sissy, don’t you think? Haven’t you always hated sissies?”

“I hate sissies to be my bros. Only tough men such as the ‘Vulture’ deserve to be my bros. I despise soft, weak crybabies most.”

Ding Lingdang punched Li Yao in his chest and laughed. “But it’s different when it comes to husband or boyfriend.

“My husband or boyfriend only needs to look after our baby at home. I will protect him if anything happens. Why do I want a tough guy for that?”

Li Yao was speechless for quite a long time. His face was trebling hard, his expressions altering nonstop. In the end, dogged determination appeared in his eyes.

The moment Ding Lingdang was going to stand up, Li Yao rolled over and pushed himself above Ding Lingdang, locking her between his arms.

“What are you doing?”

Ding Lingdang was surprised. She felt Li Yao was not himself.

“I—”

Taking a deep breath, Li Yao said with all his courage, “I would very much like to refine a piece of magical equipment for you, one that is going to be more exquisite than your Seven Star Silver-Ringed Horned Snake and Seven-colored Parrot!”

Ding Lingdang’s eyes looked like a lake that was just unfrozen in spring with ripples floating one after another.

Pushed by Li Yao’s yearning look, she was breathing heavily. A drop of sweat was flowing down the tip of her nose.

Right then, her mini crystal processors buzzed.

With an exclamation, Ding Lingdang jumped up and, failing to control her strength, hit Li Yao’s chin with her head. Li Yao was knocked over, and his tongue was bitten by his teeth, making him unable to say anything because of pain.

“I—I have a class this morning. I’m running late!”

Ding Lingdang stuttered as she tried to comb her hair again. She jumped off the roof without going through the skylight.

After a moment, she leaped out while her toothbrush was still in her mouth.

It was not until she was out of the bamboo woods that she finally shouted,

“There are many delicious foods in my home. They’re all in their old places. You must’ve been starved after the long journey to the Dark Desolate Domain. Cook them and try to get some nourishment!”

Li Yao rolled his tongue for a long time before he regained the ability to talk.

At a long distance, Ding Lingdang looked like a bolting rabbit that was being chased by a wolf. She was nearly tripped over several times.

“She ran away—just like that?”

Li Yao couldn’t believe his eyes.

This was the first time that he had ever seen Ding Lingdang running away from anything.

…

In the training room on the floating mountain of the Combat Department.

The freshmen were whispering to each other and eyeing Ding Lingdang strangely. The room had an odd vibe.

“Why are you guys acting so weird today? Do you want me to increase the difficulty of your training because you didn’t enjoy yourself enough yesterday? Class monitor, come here and talk!” Ding Lingdang screamed and shouted like a devil.

Trembling in fear, the class monitor stood up. He summoned whatever left of his guts and said, “No. Not like that, Ms. Ding. We just feel that you might be distracted; we were simply expressing our concerns.”

“I am distracted?”

Raising her eyebrows in anger, Ding Lingdang snarled, “How did you come to that conclusion? Do tell me!”

The class monitor was almost in tears. He was shaking as he said, “Because of your clothes, Ms. Ding…”

Ding Lingdang looked down and realized that she was wearing her blue pajamas with teddy bears on it.

She had left home in such a hurry that she even forgot to change her clothes.

Ding Lingdang’s cheeks was flushed. For a moment, the ‘feminine’ countenance that had once stupefied all of the freshmen was back.

But soon, the human-shaped tyrannosaurus restored control over her body. She raised her voice and shouted, “I’m relieved to find that you’ve recovered well from yesterday’s training, since you are all energetic enough to care about what clothes I’m wearing today. Excellent. Everyone’s training amount today shall be increased by thirty percent!”

…

Li Yao returned to the Refining Department in a good mood.

Despite the major transformation of the Refining Department and the ongoing infrastructural construction, the second laboratory was reserved for him, which was also his dormitory.

The moment he unsealed the barriers and walked into the laboratory, the Black Wing already dashed out from a corner and circled round him.

It hummed while it was flying, like a dog that was wagging its tail because it had seen its master again after a long time of departure.

“Little Black, I’m back!”

Seeing the Black Wing, Li Yao finally felt he’d truly returned home.

He had worried that there would be too many eyes and mouths in the training camp. Therefore, he didn’t take the Black Wing during the three months of training, which was a decision that he couldn’t regret more.

If Little Black had been with him in the Thunderous Sound Mountain, he would’ve got out of the place much more easily.

Li Yao decided that he would try to bring the Black Wing with him next time wherever he was going to.

“Haha. Stop whining like that. I’ve brought you some good stuff!”

Li Yao extended his spiritual threads into the Cosmos Ring and tossed out a scattered bone of the mutant lion dragon.

The Black Wing screamed. Hundreds of black spiritual threads crowded out and tied the bone up like a hungry tiger plunging onto a goat. The spiritual energy contained in the bone was absorbed at a crazy speed.

“It’s amazing that you’ve improved so much only after three months! The crystals that I traded with my credits have all been absorbed by you! Wow! Good job!”

Li Yao took out a leg bone of the mutant lion dragon, which was long enough for Little Black to chew for a while.

Then he sat before the large-scale crystal processor and started pondering about his future plan.

Of course, the Project Mystic Skeleton would be his main focus for the next year.

After a hundred days in the Thunder Training Camp, Li Yao had developed his own ideas about crystal suit refinement and modification, which, together with the refinement methodologies of the Hundred Smelting Clan, would surely shed new lights to the experienced refiners that had been working on the project.

However, the Project Mystic Skeleton was a collaborative work.

Li Yao had ambitions for himself.

The stronger he became, the more memory pieces of Ou Yezi he could absorb. The ancient books that he’d been learning were getting arcane, too.

Many of the secret arts were not meant to be set to public.

Therefore, Li Yao needed a personal workshop where he could refine magical equipment at his will without worrying about others’ snooping.

To build such a workshop, the best way would be to buy a world fragment and add barriers to the teleportation array so that no one else would be able to break in.

It was a common practice among the refiners.

Many master refiners had their own world fragments as their personal refining rooms.

However, it would cost a huge amount money to buy a world fragment.

A world fragment used for refining didn’t need to be as large as the Billowing Star Sea. But since it was necessary to buy the freehold of the world fragment, the price could still be as high as one billion.

Together with the cost to build a refining workshop inside the world fragment, Li Yao estimated that he needed at least 1.5 billion to finish everything.

Li Yao had made a great fortune in the Thunderous Sound Mountain. There were abundant Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures in his Cosmos Ring. The forbidden scales of the mutant lion dragon alone were valuable enough, let alone the exotic magical equipment left by the demon infiltration squad.

Li Yao kept some of the magical equipment and the precious materials for further studies, and he needed to sell off the rest of the stuff so that he could fulfil his dream of building the ‘Fiend Star Refining Workshop’.

However, the Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures were all shady. If he were to sell them through the official channel, there would be a good chance that his secret was discovered.

“It seems that I’ll need to ask for several days’ leave and make a trip to the Serpent Mountain Village.”

The Serpent Mountain Village was the biggest congregation of outlaws in the south of the federation. It was also where the biggest black market of the federation was located.

Many Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures of unknown backgrounds could only be sold off in the Serpent Mountain Village.

Naturally, the price was often lower than they should be. But the good thing was that no one would look into where they came from, or who the seller was.

Chapter 264: Three Magical Equipment Magazines

The other reason why Li Yao needed to go to Serpent Mountain Village was to uncover the secrets of his Cosmos Ring.

On his way back to the Grand Desolate War Institution, he had tried cracking the encryptions in the Cosmos Ring with his mini crystal processor.

But it didn’t take long before he discovered that there was a double-encryption inside the Cosmos Ring. It seemed that two zones, one larger and the other smaller, had been sealed in it at the same time.

Li Yao inferred that the larger zone must be the snake demon’s storage space, whereas the smaller zone was probably the storage space of one of the ring’s former masters.

The ring’s previous owner had set up a strong encryption inside the Cosmos Ring that the snake demon failed to unseal. Therefore, the demon simply added another encryption over the old one.

According to Li Yao’s calculations, it wouldn’t be difficult to crack the snake demon’s encryption. With a suitable algorithm, the large-scale crystal processor could decrypt it within several days.

However, if the snake demon’s encryption were to be cracked by brute force, the other encryption within it might be triggered and blow up the space inside the Cosmos Ring, which would definitely ruin everything contained inside.

To thoroughly crack the double-encryption was too difficult for Li Yao at present. Besides, he didn’t have special crystal processors that were designed to crack encryptions, either.

However, in the world of Cultivation, there was an occupation in a grey area called ‘Cryptohacker’.

Every Cryptohacker was both a crystal processor maniac and an expert in manipulating telepathic thoughts. Many of them were eccentric geniuses who sought no fame or fortune, but only the pleasure of deciphering an encryption.

The Serpent Mountain Village had a few such Cryptohackers. Even the large-scale encryption that the federal government set up on the Spiritual Nexus failed to block their methods.

They were the only people who possibly had the ability to crack the double-encryption in the Cosmos Ring and unravel the secrets inside for him.

“It’s decided then!

“I’ll get familiar with the progress of the Project Mystic Skeleton in the next couple of days. Then I’ll ask for a leave to the Serpent Mountain Village. If everything goes well, it will be a three-day trip at most. I’ll make best use of the weekend. Not many things will have to be postponed.”

Li Yao activated the spiritual crane messenger for work.

“The Mountain Sea Sect sent me so many messages?”

Li Yao was refreshed. He rubbed his hands together.

Three months ago, he had made a deal with the Mountain Sea Sect. According to their plan, the manufacturing process should’ve already begun. He was curious about the sales.

The Demon Beast Detector was Li Yao’s first self-refined magical equipment on which he had spared no efforts. He had hoped to make some money out of it. But more importantly, he wanted his work to be appreciated by fellow Cultivators.

Li Yao opened the messenger and started browsing in excitement.

The more he read, the more dazed he became. He was speechless for a long time before he mumbled, “Only 693 sold after an entire month?

“Bad reviews are all over the magical equipment magazines and the Spiritual Nexus forums?

“Many dealers are terminating cooperation with us?”

Li Yao scratched his head, confused.

The performance of the Demon Beast Detector had been tested by him in real battles. It was definitely not a laboratory toy.

The Mountain Sea Sect had done thorough market research and project feasibility analysis, both of which indicated a very promising prospect.

Besides, the Demon Beast Detector was the Mountain Sea Sect’s last hope. The entire sect from top to bottom had been paying great attention to it.

Their assembly line was modified under Li Yao’s personal supervision with consideration of every detail. The product quality was as good as those refined by Li Yao himself.

To expand the market share, the product was set at a relatively low price. It was meant to be a sales campaign to build up the brand image of the Mountain Sea Sect and the Fiend Star.

Although Li Yao didn’t have high hopes for his first try, the sales of below 700 for a whole month were still too horrible to look at.

After pondering for a moment, Li Yao logged in the Spiritual Nexus and bought a few virtual magical equipment magazines of the latest releases. Then he searched reviews about the Demon Beast Detector on the magazines.

There were three most famous magical equipment magazines in the Star Glory Federation, which were ‘Magical Equipment World’, ‘Refiners’ Home’ and ‘Flying Sword and Battle Armor’.

Many new articles would be updated in the three magazines, commenting on the newest magical equipment and making a lot of rankings. There were good lists such as Golden List, Most Popular List, and Most Creative List, as well bad lists such as Black List, Rotten Eggs List, and Most Superficial List.

Countless new models of magical equipment appeared in the world of Cultivation every day, which was too much for any Cultivator to test in person. Therefore, the reviews of the magical equipment magazines played an important role in helping them decide what to buy and what not to.

It was acknowledged that if a piece of magical equipment received unanimous approval from all the three magazines, its sales would be sure to soar.

On the contrary, if all the three magazines criticized a piece of magical equipment at the same time, it would be gone from the market very soon.

The Demon Beast Detector, as a beginner’s work, didn’t attract much attention in the Cultivation world. There were only several articles written by some mediocre critics in the magazines.

Li Yao opened the review posted in the ‘Magical Equipment World’ and started reading patiently.

At the beginning, the article listed some of the advantages of the Demon Beast Detector casually, such as handiness, precision, quick reaction, and so on.

Then, the article changed its style with a big ‘however’.

“However, since the Demon Beast Detector has been refined in the form of a monocle, the popping of information will surely block the wear’s vision. Besides, since it is designed to be worn on one side of the head, it risks bringing lopsidedness and thus imbalance to the body.

“Under extreme circumstances where the crystal glass was broken, it is very likely to fly into the wear’s eye and affect their combat ability.

“Moreover…”

The article, in a seemingly candid tone, listed more than ten defects, before it was eventually concluded with “All in all, as an interesting plaything created by a college student in his spare time, this piece of magical equipment is good enough in regard of completeness.”

Li Yao’s nose was almost put out of joint because of anger.

Perfect magical equipment did not exist. The Demon Beast Detector had its own defects and limitations just as any other magical equipment did.

But the article was simply nitpicking the Demon Beast Detector based on criteria so harsh that were bordering on absurdness.

It could be compared to criticizing a chainsword for lack of long-range attack abilities and decrying a crystal railgun because it was unsuitable for melee combat; it was utter BS!

It was correct that putting on a Demon Beast Detector on one of the ears would affect the body balance, but so would a chainsword or any other magical equipment carried by a Cultivator. Never would any Cultivator carry a chainsword on the middle of their back for the sake of balance control!

It was also true that the crystal glass might stab the eyes when it was broken. But any battle armor and crystal suit would have the potential danger of stabbing the wearer’s body when they were broken. Criticizing magical equipment for that was just like giving up eating for fear of choking.

Li Yao cursed the writer of the article in mind and opened the review in ‘Refiners’ Home’.

This article didn’t talk much about the shining points and shortcomings of the Demon Beast Detector itself. Instead, the main topic of the article was Li Yao and the Mountain Sea Sect.

It didn’t vilify them. On the contrary, there were words of praises between the lines all over the article.

But after reading the entire article, one would recognize that Li Yao was a beginner in the trade of refiners, and that the Mountain Sea Sect was a combat sect without much experience in refining precise magical equipment whose last product, the Hunting Watch, was a brutal failure. They were brave enough to refine precise magical equipment. But the performance and quality of their product would be a big question mark.

Li Yao was so infuriated that he nostril grew even wider.

This article was even more sordid than the previous one. Everything in the article so true that there was not much to pick on.

‘Flying Sword and Battle Armor’ had used to be a professional magazine that focused on flying-sword-type magical equipment and battle-armor-type magical equipment exclusively. Later, it began to expand its repertoire and post reviews on other military magical equipment.

It had the most proficiency and authority of all the three magical equipment magazines.

The article in Flying Sword and Battle Armor was the shortest.

It did not note the advantages and disadvantages of the product, nor did it cling to Li Yao or the Mountain Sea Sect’s background. Instead, it pointed out the problem of the Demon Beast Detector succinctly.

Judging from its designing purpose, the Demon Beast Detector was a piece of ancillary magical equipment for the solo hunters on the Grand Desolate Plateau.

But such solo hunters often boasted extraordinary perceptiveness and computational ability, as well as personal strength. They were already able to memorize features and skills of many demon beast without the help of the Demon Beast Detector.

Those who needed the Demon Beast Detector most were actually low-level Cultivators and ordinary soldiers.

But they often went on missions in groups with large-scale probe magical equipment. The Demon Beast Detector was redundant for them.

“A product of mixed-up orientation with uninspiring functions.”

This was the conclusion in ‘Flying Sword and Battle Armor’.

Li Yao was sincerely convinced by the article.

He had been thinking of the target customer and function limitations lately and was preparing to add communication and map functions to the new version of Demon Beast Detector.

But the problems alone were obviously not enough to pull the sales down to only 600.

Li Yao thought for a while and entered a forum named ‘Blood and Slaughter’.

It was a famous forum among demon beast hunters with a lot of Cultivator users who’d share their experiences in the Grand Desolate with other people.

There was a board in the forum that was especially for posting the personal experiences with a particular piece of magical equipment, which was quite popular among middle-level and low-level Cultivators.

Li Yao found 57 threads that were related to the Demon Beast Detector, none of which were positive.

“This is absolutely garbage. It worked fine at first but was entirely broken after I was tripped over one time during the battle. Later, it couldn’t even distinguish low-level demon soldiers from middle-level ones, which almost killed me!”

“Poor design. Very uncomfortable when pinned to ear. Feels like the ear is stuffed if you’re sweating.”

“Don’t ever try it. It is just a scam concocted by a college student and some third-rate sect!”

Reading the threads, Li Yao squinted. Sharp glint was shining in his eyes.

Only six hundred pieces had been sold off. Yet, some 50 users were already posting negative reviews in a small forum at a time and date that was extremely close to the Demon Beast Detector’s debut.

It was just like they bought one copy immediately after the Demon Beast Detector was released, went straight on fighting in the depths of the Grand Desolate Plateau, and returned to condemn it on the Nexus the very next day.

One or two cases were possible. But more than twenty similar threads…

Together with the biased reviews in the three magical equipment magazines, Li Yao seemed to have sensed the scent of a conspiracy.

Chapter 265: Fight a Shark

The last message sent by Jiang Wenbo made Li Yao jump out of his chair.

“What? The Mountain Sea Sect is going to be bought out?”

He couldn’t bear it any longer and contacted Jiang Wenbo through the spiritual crane messenger.

Two lackluster faces appeared in the light beam. It was Jiang Wenbo and Guan Xiong who were discussing the sect affairs.

“Mr. Jiang, Brother Xiong, what’s going on?

“Reviews on the ‘Flying Sword and Battle Armor’ could be called fair, but those on the ‘Magical Equipment World’ and ‘Refiners’ Home’ were downright outrageous. There are a lot of negative comments in the major forums too. It’s unreasonable!

“It’s also unreasonable, according to your letters, that many dealers are terminating cooperation with us!

“The Demon Beast Detector has only been set to public for a month. Without major quality flaws, the dealers wouldn’t terminate their cooperation even though the sales are not looking good at present.

“Now, you’re also saying that the Mountain Sea Sect is going to be bought out by some other sect. What’s happening exactly?”

Li Yao posed all his questions fast and straightforward.

Jiang Wenbo looked at Guan Xiong and sighed.

“Li Yao, your guess is correct. We were ambushed. Somebody’s had their eyes on the Demon Beast Detector since before it was on sale.

“There’s something wrong with the reviews in the three magical equipment magazines; someone has been behind the negative threads on the forums too; according to our secret investigation, many of the dealers terminated the cooperation because of intense pressure from outside.

“However, none of that is our biggest problem.

“The Demon Beast Detector is a finely-made piece of magical equipment. According to the feedback we collected from the real customers, most of them are very satisfied and willing to recommend it to their friends. As long as we persist, the sales will definitely boom with the word of mouth.

“But right now, our biggest problem is—”

Jiang Wenbo paused for a moment. Then he said in a self-mocking smile, “It doesn’t matter now. Might as well just tell you the truth. It’s been spreading all over the Cultivation world anyway. The Mountain Sea Sect’s going to have a capital chain rupture!”

“What?!”

Li Yao was shocked.

The capital status of a sect is the secret of all secrets. Once the capital chain rupture is known by the public, the following chain reactions will destroy a sect easily!

The fact that Jiang Wenbo was telling him the top secret meant that it was not a secret anymore.

Jiang Wenbo smiled bitterly.

“A few reviews on the magazines or forums are not fatal; even though many dealers have terminated cooperation, I still have a lot of life-long friends supporting us; also, we can always sell them on the Nexus.

“But right now, it was the crystal camera supplier that set us up.

“Our crystal camera supplier, after providing the first batch of crystal cameras, had been delaying the delivery of goods with all kinds of excuses. When we communicated with them, they guaranteed that everything was alright. The postponement was due to force majeure, specifically, short of raw materials. They promised that they would deliver the rest of the goods before the deadline and compensate for our loss because of the delay.

“There had been a deep trust between us after many years of cooperation. So, we believed what they said.

“Before we received the crystal cameras, we had semi-refined thousands of Demon Beast Detectors and even presold them.

“But, in the end, after postponing for three times, the crystal camera supplier scrapped the contract and terminated the cooperation!

“As a result, we had to recall all our presold orders and double-refunded our customers’ advance payment. It had a bad influence on our brand image, too.

“Even worse, the thousands of semi-manufactured Demon Beast Detectors had all been refined based on the parameters of their crystal camera model. It was difficult to find substitution.”

Li Yao nodded.

As a refiner, he was well aware that the parameters of crystal cameras refined by different sects varied significantly. In refining, a one-millimeter divergence would be more than enough to stop the component from being universal.

But there was one other thing he didn’t understand.

“Mr. Jiang, when you signed the contract with this crystal camera supplier, there must be breach clauses on it, wasn’t there? The liquidated damages must be a lot more than your loss, aren’t they?”

Jiang Wenbo said, “Li Yao, you’re not an admin-type Cultivator. You don’t understand.

“Yes, there are breach clauses on the contract. But now, they refuse to acknowledge the contract. So, we’ll have to file a lawsuit and sort everything out in a federal court. The trial might take one year or even two years. Of course, we will win the case in the end, but it’s going to be three to five years later when we really get the liquidated damages!”

Li Yao thought for a moment. But he was still puzzled.

“But what can they gain from all this? They’re losing both their money and their credit. Have they decided to commit suicide while dragging the Mountain Sea Sect down with them?”

Jiang Wenbo shook his head.

“You’re wrong. The Mountain Sea Sect will die before them. Two of our loans will be due by the end of next month. We lost a fortune because of this accident. There’s no way we can pay the loans now.

“What is even weirder is that the capital status of the Mountain Sea Sect was somehow leaked. The entire Cultivation world now all know of the Mountain Sea Sect is going to go bankrupt at any moment. No one dares to lend any money to us right now.”

Li Yao frowned. A moment later, he asked, “Mr. Jiang, can you tell me how much the capital gap is for the Mountain Sea Sect?”

Jiang Wenbo was dazed for a second. Guan Xiong, who’d been sitting beside him with a grave face, said, “With everything going to this far, there’s nothing worth hiding now! Even our financial statement has been set to public! Besides, the Demon Beast Detector is our mutual project. Li Yao is our partner. He deserves to know our actual status.

“Now, the entire sect, from top to bottom, is trying everything we can and pulling all kinds of strings. We estimate that there will be a three hundred to five hundred million funding gap next month. If we can’t work it out, the Mountain Sea Sect will be doomed when the capital chain rupture occurs!”

Li Yao nodded in agreement.

A three hundred to five hundred million gap might not seem very much for a sect, but the actual situation was a lot worse than it sounded.

A chain is a serial assembly of links that are closely connected to one another.

The Mountain Sea Sect had been in debt due to ill-management for many years. To embark on the Demon Beast Detector project, it borrowed a lot of loans from banks and other sects. The total loans were as high as several billion.

All the investors had been paying close attention to the sales of the Demon Beast Detector as well as the capital status of the Mountain Sea Sect.

If the Demon Beast Detector became an instant hit with amazing sales, the banks and sects definitely wouldn’t try to recover their money in a hurry. Instead, they might even lend more money to the Mountain Sea Sect in order to accumulate more interest.

But as it turned out, the Demon Beast Detector was a bummer in the market. With the cash flow of the Mountain Sea Sect running out, there would be chain reactions that may lead to bankruptcy. No bank or sect would agree to lend loans under such circumstances. They would only demand the Mountain Sea Sect pay their debts as soon as possible.

The Mountain Sea Sect would be hopeless if so!

Li Yao had a vague feeling that this whole incident had been a serial trap from the very beginning.

“Somebody must be behind all this. Do you have any theory who might be targeting the Mountain Sea Sect and our Demon Beast Detector?” Li Yao asked coldly. Dangerous brilliance was beaming in his eyes.

Before Jiang Wenbo opened his mouth, Guan Xiong said furiously,

“I don’t have any valid evidence. But ten days ago, the Zephyr Guild spoke boldly that it was going to acquire the Mountain Sea Sect and make us a sub-branch of the Zephyr Guild!”

“The Zephyr Guild!”

It immediately occurred to Li Yao that the Zephyr Guild had reached out to him when he just got the patent of the Demon Beast Detector, which wanted to buy out his patent at a very cheap price and was turned down by him.

Jiang Wenbo said, “The Zephyr Guild is a traditional conglomerate in the field of precise magical equipment refining, which has been shifting to the probe magical equipment in recent years. Their advertising expense has been astronomical.

“However, the Zephyr Guild was first known by the watches they refined. Their probe magical equipment is all worn on wrists.

“I bought several of their products before. The design and precision are indeed much better than those of our Demon Beast Detector.

“But I still think the Demon Beast Detector will work better in real battles.”

Li Yao squinted and said, “You mean, if the Demon Beast Detector goes popular, the market of the Zephyr Guild’s probe magical equipment might shrink and cause them great losses?”

“Of course!”

Jiang Wenbo added, “Also, the foul moves that we’ve been suffering from recently are exactly the style of the ‘shark’.”

Li Yao didn’t know the name, “Who is this ‘shark’?”

“He is the nickname of the young master of the Zephyr Guild, Qiu Guanyu, a talented admin-type Cultivator. Although he’s only 29 years old, he has led several mergers and helped the Zephyr Guild swallow many sects that are of smaller size.”

Jiang Wenbo continued, “Qiu Guanyu is both meticulous and merciless. He is best known for his style of killing without spilling blood. If he wants to take over a sect, he will try everything he can to suffocate the sect until it has no choice but to be devoured by the Zephyr Guild, with furs, skins, bones, and all!

“In the seven years since he started his career, he has taken over eleven sects in such way. Every year, one or two sects will become his new sacrifice. Therefore, he has been nicknamed the ‘shark’!”

“So, this is the case. I understand it now.”

Li Yao asked again, “Mr. Jiang, Brother Xiong, what are the opinions inside the Mountain Sea Sect about the takeover?”

“Of course we hate it!”

Guan Xiong shouted, “If it were months ago when the Mountain Sea Sect was in desperation, we might’ve agreed to their terms if the Zephyr Guild wanted to buy us out, however unwillingly.

“But right now, with such an excellent product, the Demon Beast Detector, when we’re ready for something big, this sleazy shark jumped on us and wanted us to bear the insult without complaints? Whoever wants to go there can go, but I definitely won’t! To think that I might call the shark ‘master’ one day in the future is enough to kill me!

“Anyways, if the Mountain Sea Sect is to be taken over, I’ll just resign and be a free Cultivator!”

Jiang Wenbo said, “Few in the Mountain Sea Sect are looking forward to the merger. But is there anything we can do about it?”

Li Yao didn’t give an answer. He observed, “The bottom line is, if you have three to five billion by the end of next month, you’ll be able to survive the trouble temporarily, correct?”

Jiang Wenbo nodded. Then his eyes grew wide as he shouted, failing to control his voice,

“Li Yao, what do you want?”

Pausing after each word, Li Yao said, “I want to go to the Zephyr Guild and meet this so-called shark.”

Jiang Wenbo blurted out, “You know nothing about business and you are definitely no match for the shark. What’s more, even if we can fix the loan issue temporarily, there are still bigger capital gaps in the future if the sales of the Demon Beast Detector remain at the current level. This will be a bottomless hole. There’s no need to jump into it! Besides, it is just our speculation. We don’t our any solid evidence to pin the whole scheme on the Zephyr Guild!”

“You’ll figure out how to solve the funding problem later! As long as Mr. Jiang, Brother Xiong and the rest of the Mountain Sea Sect stick together until the end, there will definitely be a way out! As for evidence—”

Li Yao smiled. His sharp teeth were glaring as he said, “Do you think the vulture needs ‘solid evidence’ to launch a counterattack when it is offended?”

Chapter 266: Laws of the Outlaws

Spiritual Wind City was located hundreds of kilometers away, a prosperous metropolis in the middle of the federation.

In the center of the city stood a jade-like, rosily-shining skyscraper, which was the headquarters of the Zephyr Guild, one of the top hundred sects in the federation.

Wind was blowing hard on the rooftop. A handsome man whose hair was long enough to reach his waist had a greedy expression, his face aglow from the lights of the city below him.

His long, silver hair was motionless in the blowing wind.

Suddenly—

The man took a deep, deep breath that seemed to be absorbing all the opulence of the city into his stomach like a giant whale which was sucking water.

Weirdly, his chest did not inflate despite the deep breath.

After more than a minute of inhaling, his cheeks were finally flushed in satisfaction. But there was no sign of exhaling. He turned around.

“Young master, the Mountain Sea Sect firmly declined our merger proposal yet again.”

Respectfully, a subordinate handed over a crystal processor to him.

Qiu Guanyu, the young master of the Zephyr Guild, known as the ‘shark’, replied calmly with a cruel smile, “Just another futile, dying struggle. A prey that has been bitten in the middle of their body by me can never get away, right?”

He liked the feeling when his prey rolled over and over in his mouth, only to be shredded, chewed, and swallowed in the end.

Qiu Guanyu was an admin-type Cultivator. His path of Cultivation had been building up the Zephyr Guild by leading it to swallow other sects.

Every time the Zephyr Guild took in a sect and became bigger than before, boundless power would be absorbed by him and improve his capability significantly.

Business was war!

For Qiu Guanyu, swallowing other sects in business was a way of Cultivation, just like fighting the demon beasts was for the battle-type Cultivators.

Eyes closed, he seemed to have heard the cries in the Mountain Sea Sect whose every method had come to a dead end. Countless power was crowding in his blood and soul.

When the Mountain Sea Sect was fully embedded, his strength would arrive at a new peak!

“Young master, right now, we still have the chance to negotiate with the patent owner of the Demon Beast Detector and make a new deal with him. There’s no need to waste so many resources buying out the Mountain Sea Sect.”

He was Qiu Guanyu’s trusted subordinate. That’s why he was bold enough to propose a different plan.

“You mean, that guy ‘Li Yao’?”

Qiu Guanyu squinted and said, “He is not a nearsighted guy. Quite on the contrary, he is very shrewd. He must’ve already realized that his Demon Beast Detector has tremendous value. If we go to him right now, he will know that it is probably more valuable than he thought and thus quote an unacceptable price for us.

“Besides—

“I like to give other people opportunities. But only once. It depends on them whether or not they grab it.

“Last time, I gave him an opportunity by sending someone to talk with him, but he turned me down.

“He wants a second chance? Come and beg me!”

…

Seven days later, on a spiritual airship to Serpent Mountain Village located in the south frontier which had been known as ‘the most chaotic city of the federation’.

Serpent Mountain Village was formally known as ‘Serpent City’. It had been a small fishing village on the south border of the federation. But over a hundred years, it became a super city with a population of over ten million.

Serpent City was a very special city that claimed to be ‘a place without laws’. It boasted the largest black market, casino, and grey industries that verged on the illegal in the entire Star Glory Federation.

With enough money in pocket, one could buy strengthening drugs with amazing performance and yet of instable quality; one could buy all kinds of attack magical equipment that had been banned by the government due to their uncontrollable might; one could even buy Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures of unknown backgrounds here.

If one did not have enough money on hand, one could fight and gain fame in the thrilling fight clubs with one’s own hands.

In short, Serpent City was just like the ‘underground ghost city’ in every city of the federation, only a hundred times bigger and more extravagant. One could say that it was a ‘super underground ghost city’ at service of all Cultivators.

The federal government, if determined, of course had the power to demolish the city. But as the ancient saying put, ‘he who is mighty tends to break the rules’. The Cultivators were too strong to be bound by government’s rules on everything, and they hoped that there was a space where they could do whatever they wanted.

Many Cultivators were in a lot of stress due to years of fighting in the wilderness and wandering on the edge of death. They needed a place to let out their pressure too.

It wouldn’t be difficult to get rid of the Serpent City in reality. But it would be another thing to demolish the Serpent City in every Cultivator’s mind.

This was how humanity worked. Cultivators were human beings, too, who had their bright side and their dark side. Suppressing darkness did not mean that it would be gone; it would only lead to greater trouble once it was accumulated.

Therefore, the government might as well designate a special area for their catharsis.

For example, Li Yao, who had got a batch of Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures and did not wish their background to be known, could go to the black market of the Serpent City to sell them off.

However, he would still have to find a place to sell them if there were no Serpent City, in which case he’d need to make secret transactions with the potential buyer which might lead to a gang fight due to mutual distrust.

In light of this, Serpent City was kept as a sanctuary for the darkness and lawlessness of the Cultivators, as depicted in the saying ‘when the water is too clear, there will be no fish living in it’.

Right now, the government had two, and only two, ironclad rules for Serpent City:

Firstly, the affairs inside the Serpent City should be handled within Serpent City. Any matter that was out of the range of Serpent City should be left alone.

Secondly, the conflicts among Cultivators should be settled among Cultivators and wouldn’t be investigated unless either party asked to, even if there were murder cases. Moreover, it was strictly forbidden for Cultivators to harm the interests of ordinary people, and if anyone did, the guilty Cultivator would be sentenced with much severer punishments than outside.

The two iron rules had been well carried out.

Right now, the daily cash flow of the Serpent City was at the scale of billions. Major forces of the city were all endorsed by top sects of the federation, who worked together to maintain the order of the city and would never allow any psycho to interfere with their business.

For the ordinary people, not only were they safe under the current system, they could also benefit from the affluent Cultivators who were not hesitant to give them tips as much as 30,000 or even 50,000 after winning a fortune in a casino.

Therefore, the ordinary people approved of Serpent City as well.

Five hours later, the spiritual airship landed on the suburb of the Serpent City.

Li Yao took the spiritual subway to downtown.

Walking on the street with palms and coconut trees on both sides while the sea breeze brushed his face gently, Li Yao felt nice and cozy when he saw the citizens walking and talking in laughter.

It never occurred to him that the most chaotic city of the federation, a place without laws, could be as peaceful as other metropolises and so much more elegant that the underground ghost city of Floating Spear City.

However, Li Yao was not going to let down his alert so fast.

He had pinned two ‘Face Twisters’ inside his mouth, which was a kind of special magical equipment that could twist the user’s facial muscles by unleashing special bioelectricity. Wearing them, it seemed that Li Yao had done a plastic surgery.

Through spiritual energy manipulation, his height had also shrunk by a large degree.

Right now, Li Yao seemed to be a ten-year-older low-level Cultivator who was ready to enjoy himself a little bit after brutal battles on the Grand Desolate Plateau.

People like him were everywhere in the Serpent City.

He was carrying a grey military backpack which contained some Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures of little value. A chainsword was swinging on his waist to add to his disguise.

His trump cards were all inside his Cosmos Ring. The reason why he was delayed for seven days was to refine more attack magical equipment.

Other than the regular stuff, he’d also brought fifty Hellfire-Lightnings.

This time, he didn’t forget to bring Little Black and also hid it in the Cosmos Ring.

It would be best if everybody just left him alone. If he was pissed off, he could just throw the fifty Hellfire-Lightnings to their base and fly away on the Black Wing. Nobody would ever be able to catch him.

While thinking about that, Li Yao reached a building under a sign that read ‘Bountiful Treasures Pavilion’ and walked inside.

The Bountiful Treasures Pavilion was one of the largest black market in Serpent City. Although it was called a ‘black market’, it was most famous for good service and thorough safety measures.

Trading with the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion might be a little bit less profitable, but the process would always be fair and square.

The Bountiful Treasures Pavilion even offered security guards that could escort their customers until they were out of Serpent City.

Should anything happen to the customer who traded with the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion, its endorser would find out the suspect drastically and eliminate him in a way that was much crueler than the secret police.

The first floor of the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion was a hall for the exchange of common materials, where dozens of Cultivators in similar clothes to Li Yao’s were doing their business busily.

They all looked up in amazement, as a beautiful, elegant lady walked out and greeted the newcomer, “Mr. Fang, nice to meet you. This pavilion is honored by your presence. This way, please. Our manager, Mr. Lin, has been waiting for you.”

Fang Ping was a pseudonym that Li Yao made up for himself.

It was an ordinary, almost boring, name that couldn’t possibly be related to his identity or his past.

While he was on his way, he already reached out to the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion and sent a hologram of the forbidden scales of the mutant lion dragon to them.

The precious material instantly made him a VIP of the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion, which even assigned a senior client manager for him.

The Bountiful Treasures Pavilion even offered to pick him up from the station. But Li Yao rejected because he didn’t want to flaunt his possessions.

“That guy must have got something really valuable!”

“A fortune! A great fortune for sure!”

“I hope that I will be invited to the VIP room and talk to a special client manager face to face one day!”

Many low-level Cultivators were looking at Li Yao with pure jealousy.

Chapter 267: First Bucket of Gold

In the luxurious lift for VIPs, Li Yao ascended to the VIP reception room on the 22nd floor.

The room was decorated in an ancient style, with many Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures placed on the display racks around.

Li Yao glimpsed at them and was surprised.

The Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures were rare and costly, many of which were as valuable as his forbidden scales, if not more.

Such precious Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures were just lying on the display racks working as ornaments! The Bountiful Treasures Pavilion was indeed wealthy!

Then Li Yao realized that this was a way to show the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion’s stock, as well as a way to strike the customer’s confidence.

If a customer walked into the room and saw so many precious materials, he would subconsciously believe that the items he was going to sell were not as valuable as they should be and thus give a lower quote for them.

“Mr. Fang, hello!”

A scholarly-looking middle-aged man with glossy hair walked to Li Yao, “I am Lin Cheng, the VIP client manager of the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion. Please sit down.”

Li Yao nodded to him. Then he patted his backpack, indicating that he did not want to waste his time in small talk and would rather get down to business directly.

Smiling, Mr. Lin showed Li Yao to a giant crystal table.

The crystal table had been carved out of an intact, flawless crystal. Data and information were jumping nonstop inside the table, suggesting that it was an embedded crystal processor with amazing computational ability.

An ivory mist enveloped the crystal table.

“A hybrid of the liger-type demon beast and the dragon-type demon beast is very rare in the market. Also, according to the hologram that you sent to us, it is a mutated one, which makes the materials from it all the more valuable! Please rest assured, Mr. Fang. They will be worth a fortune, if they’re truly authentic.”

Mr. Lin talked straightforwardly, as if he were really on Li Yao’s side. Li Yao, although aware that the manager would try to slash the price later, still felt that what he said was genuine and warm.

This was what a real business man should look like.

Li Yao took out two forbidden scales from his backpack and put them on the crystal table.

The ivory mist blinked, then it swelled and crowed to the forbidden scales which were carefully examined without any detail being left out.

Hundreds of pieces of data popped up inside the crystal table.

Typing fast on the virtual keyboard for a moment, Mr. Lin raised his eyebrows and said hesitatingly,

“Mr. Fang, not that I intentionally quote you at a low price, but things are complicated here. The two forbidden scales of a mutant lion dragon that you offered contain the power of both lineages. What’s more, mutation has made their sturdiness much better than the scales on common dragon-type demon beasts. They’re excellent materials indeed.

“However, their state of preservation is not very good, which seems to be a result of an intensive collision. They look good on the surface, but there are cracks everywhere inside them.

“Mr. Fang, you should know that materials like forbidden scales are best for the refinement of shields or armors. However, given that the two forbidden scales are full of inner cracks, the defense ability that they can provide is questionable. Therefore, their worth may not be as high as you expected.”

Mr. Lin continued typing on the virtual keyboard for a while. Then he looked up and said, “Mr. Fang, this is your first time to do business with us. Forbidden scales of the mutant lion dragon are rare too. In light of our future cooperation, I’ll quote you 50 million for the two forbidden scales. How does it sound?”

Li Yao didn’t give an answer. He was very well aware that the two forbidden scales were in bad condition, otherwise he wouldn’t decide to trade them in the first place.

Back when he was in the Thunderous Sound Mountain, in order to resist the scourge of the demon core explosion, he had raised all the three forbidden scales above his head as a shield, two of which were so seriously damaged that he could tell it with his bare hands.

The third forbidden scale was relatively intact. He couldn’t bear to sell it and planned to refine an ancient-style light armor with the secret technique from 40,000 years ago as well as some other materials.

However, a quote of 50 million…

Li Yao didn’t show any sign of approval or disapproval. He took out from his backpack a lot of neatly-conserved demon tendons, demon bones, demon paws and demon teeth which all came from the mutant lion dragon.

Mr. Lin was sort of surprised. He glanced at Li Yao quickly and then focused on the new materials wholeheartedly. A moment later, he nodded in satisfaction.

“Good. Good. All of the materials are from the same mutant lion dragon. Although they are all damaged more or less due to what seems to be a big explosion, they can help improve the defense ability of the forbidden scales if they’re refined together.”

Li Yao didn’t stop. He continued bringing out the trophies he got from the infiltration squad of the demon clan, which finally caused Mr. Lin’s eyes to light up with astonishment.

Although members of the infiltration squad were only at the demon general level, a lot of them had carried magical equipment of the Blood Demon Sector.

Strong magical equipment such as the Soul Stealer and the materials that were relatively unblemished were too valuable for Li Yao to sell.

But the poorer items that he brought out were enough to dazzle Mr. Lin.

Mr. Lin stopped talking. He picked up a pair of glasses which was in a bizarre shape and looked like an ivory mini-sized telescope from the bottom of the crystal table and put it on his nose. Two silver lights beamed out from the glasses. He scrutinized the items on the table.

After a long time, he exhaled and said, “Despite the bad state of preservation, there are really a whole lot of them. Together with the two forbidden scales, well…

“The two forbidden scales have 11 cracks and 14 cracks inside, resulting to a defense loss of 22% and 37% respectively. But since you’ve brought a lot of demon bones that are of the same origin with the forbidden scales, we can grind them and insert the powder into the forbidden scales to fill the cracks.”

Before he was able to propose his new quote, Li Yao interrupted him, “After repairing, sturdiness of the two forbidden scales should be able to be recovered to above 85%, which is similar to another precious defense material named “Ink Snake’s Seven-inch Skin”. But Ink Snake’s Seven-inch Skin can rarely be so large. Usually, it has to be stitched together to make it larger, and the joints are its fatal weakness!

“At market, an Ink Snake’s Seven-inch Skin of such size is worth more than 70 million, and you may not have the chance to buy it even if you have the money.

“Although the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion is a black market, a quote of only 50 million for the two forbidden scales of the mutant lion dragon is still too unfrank. I think we can stop here if you insist on your quote.”

Mr. Link was truly shocked by what he said. He changed his attitude from superficial hospitality to sincere respect.

He wiped the cold sweat on his forehead. Calculating in silence for a moment, he said, “Mr. Fang, you are an expert of the trade. Let’s just call a spade a spade. It’s correct that the two forbidden scales, once repaired, could be as sturdy as the Ink Snake’s Seven-inch Skin. But they have been damaged in battle after all in the first place. Many rich Cultivators wouldn’t like to spend a fortune on a battle armor made of renovated materials, however perfectly it has been renewed.

“Therefore, the price of the Ink Snake’s Seven-inch Skin does not fit in this scenario.

“100 million.

“100 million for the two forbidden scales.

“And another 100 million for the rest of the stuff combined.

“Mr. Fang, this is the best that the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion can offer. As an expert, you should know that the quote is about their true worth. After all, we need to make profit, too.”

Li Yao nodded slightly. 200 million was quite close to his estimation.

Through official channel, he could sell them at a price 30 to 50 million higher, but there would be traces of the transaction. The black market, on the other hand, was much more direct and straightforward.

“Okay. I want twenty soul-marked cards with face value of 10 million.”

A soul-marked card was a special, anonymous gold transfer card provided by banks for the exchanges of significant size among Cultivators.

Although the card was anonymous, a Cultivator could leave a unique soul mark inside the card and bind the soul mark with other bank cards.

Once the card was stolen, the Cultivator could feel it immediately and transfer the money in the card to other cards telepathically. The soul mark could also be used to locate where the card was.

Since it was anonymous and theft-proof, the soul-marked card was quite popular among Cultivators.

It didn’t take much time before twenty violet soul-marked cards were delivered to Li Yao.

Splitting twenty telepathic thoughts, binding the soul-marked cards one by one, and sensing the ‘10,000,000’ in each and every of them, Li Yao was so dizzy that he felt he was standing on a pile of cotton.

A lot of feelings were rolling over in his mind.

A year and a half ago, he was still a boy of no fame or fortune among the Common Class students on the playground of Crimson Nimbus Second High School watching the prestigious Fiend Blade Peng Hai flying in the sky, saliva hanging on his lips.

At that time, he was told that Cultivators such as Fiend Blade Peng Hai were all billionaires. They seemed to be an unreachable dream for him.

But now, he had become a billionaire, too?

Taking in a deep breath, Li Yao found that among other feelings, there was not much excitement.

Because he was a Cultivator.

To be a billionaire might be a life-long dream for an ordinary man, but it was just the start line in the Cultivation world.

What’s more, what he was pursuing could not be bought by money.

Mr. Lin smiled and said, “Mr. Fang, this is your first time here and you’ve already brought us such a big deal. I am personally benefited from you, too, with the brokerage that I’m going to get. Thank you very much, Mr. Fang. If there’s anything else that you need, feel free to ask me. Although the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion is just a marketplace, we have a lot of connections in the Serpent City, and it is our top principle to serve the customers until they’re satisfied.”

Li Yao thought of something. He asked, “Besides purchasing materials, I believe you sell them, too?”

Mr. Lin nodded. He pushed a crystal processor over and smiled politely.

“Of course. The Bountiful Treasures Pavilion is one of the largest material exchange centers in the south of the federation. We provide whatever materials you’re interested in. This is the latest inventory of materials we offer. Please take a look, Mr. Fang.”

The crystal processor had an amazing performance. The moment Li Yao opened the inventory, he entered a Half-step Great Illusionary Land. Countless streams of information flowed into his brain, which were introductions to thousands of materials. It was just the table of contents. If going to details, there were millions of materials on the list.

Li Yao glanced through them and sighed. Whatever excitement he had when he just got the 200 million was completely gone now.

These materials were too expensive!

‘It seems that 200 million for a Cultivators is no different than 20 thousand for an ordinary man. In the blink of an eye, it’ll all be gone!’

Chapter 268: The Unknown and the Defective

 

‘Essence of the Sand Orchid, 40 million for one piece? Tiger-soul Ice Stripes Egg, 66 million for one piece? What, there’s even the demon core of a Heavenly Thunder Wolf? Modifying the Hellfire-Lightnings with that can improve their power by dozens of times. But its price is insane, too. 250 million for one!’

Li Yao browsed through the inventory greedily.

As a magical equipment maniac, he was dazzled by the rare Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures in the inventory and was of half a mind to buy all of them.

But looking at his pocket, he noticed, sadly, that there were only twenty soul-marked cards inside, which were not even enough to buy five different kinds of the materials.

Li Yao seemed to have gone back to the day when he was staring at the roasted duck worthy of a few hundred bulks through the shop window hungrily with only a few coins in his pocket.

‘Cultivation is indeed a money-burning job!

‘I used to do refining with ordinary materials and didn’t understand it. But now that I want to refine some strong magical equipment based on Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures, I finally know that money is indeed a precious thing!

‘Based on the secret refining techniques from Ou Yezi’s memory pieces, I can refine some magical equipment that is suitable for me and can significantly improve my combat ability. But according to this inventory, the raw materials alone would cost me one billion!

‘And that was not counting the cost of the Fiend Star Refining Workshop.

‘Even if I buy a world fragment with a mortgage, I’ll still have to make a 30% down payment. Considering that I’m only a Refinement Stage Cultivator and a college student with no stable income, the banks might not agree to the down payment rate. If they ask for a higher rate, the money that I need to pay will greatly increase!

‘Besides, there’s still the cost of the modification of the world fragment.

‘Since I’m going to build my personal refining workshop, naturally, everything should be done according to the highest standards, which will presumably cost me several hundred million.

‘These expenses, counted together, almost reach two billion.

‘Besides, I still want to wrestle with this shark, Qiu Guanyu, of the Zephyr Guild.

‘Which means I need another three to five hundred million.’

Li Yao was gritting his teeth without him knowing.

He wasn’t a man who was willing to bend his knee to the powerful. Besides, Guan Xiong of the Mountain Sea Sect had saved his life before.

The Zephyr Guild browbeat the Mountain Sea Guild into surrendering the Demon Beast Detector by foul play, which had truly infuriated Li Yao.

As a refiner, he treated the magical equipment refined by him as his children.

Now that the Zephyr Guild had been slandering his ‘children’, he was ready to make a serious comeback.

‘Should I sell some more materials?’

Li Yao couldn’t make up his mind.

The materials left in the Cosmos Ring had been carefully selected by him. They hadn’t been affected by the explosion and were all in good condition.

He was preparing to refine them into magical equipment. That way, he would gain a much bigger profit.

Seeing through his hesitation, Mr. Lin brought out a second inventory of materials without saying anything.

Materials on the second inventory were much cheaper than those on the previous one. Most of their prices were at the level of millions. Some of the materials were even only a few hundred thousand a piece.

However, after a quick glance, Li Yao discovered that he barely knew any stuff on the inventory, and the few Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures that he knew were much cheaper than the market price.

Li Yao looked at Mr. Lin in suspicion.

Mr. Lin explained, “They’re all unknown materials and defective materials, which is why their price is lower than normal.”

The cosmos was so enormous that there were many materials that the Cultivators of the Heaven’s Origin Sector never saw, never knew, and failed to perceive their characteristics when they found one.

Some of the materials were retrieved from world fragments; some were brought to the Heaven’s Origin Sector by falling stars; some were discovered in the deep underground of the Heaven’s Origin Sector.

Since their backgrounds and attributes were obscure, it was difficult to refine them into magical equipment. Therefore, their prices were relatively low.

However, if someone was smart enough to see the value of an unknown material and its possible usage, he would be able to buy a real bargain.

As for the defective materials, they were like the forbidden scales that Li Yao brought, only hundreds of times more seriously damaged, bordering on the irreparable. Therefore, their prices were much lower than their normal counterparts. Sometimes it was only one tenth of the original price.

If a refiner had a secret technique to fix the materials, or simply chose to use them for auxiliary purposes, it would be a good bargain, too, to buy some of the defective materials back.

Li Yao’s eyes were glaring in delight.

There were some secret techniques in the Hundred Smelting Clan to fix the defective materials. Although it was impossible to entirely renew the materials, the utility rate of them could be considerably improved.

Now that he was not rich enough to buy the first-class materials, he might as well buy some defective ones.

“How can I buy the unknown materials and the defective materials?”

Mr. Lin smiled.

“The trading procedure for unknown materials and defective materials is different from that for ordinary materials.

“Since the quality and performance of the ordinary materials are relatively stable, the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion guarantee that all of them are exactly fit to their descriptions on the inventory. Our customers can buy whatever they want by shopping through the inventory. If they are not satisfied at their purchase when it is delivered, whatever they’ve bought can be refunded or replaced at their will.

“But the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion cannot confirm the value of the unknown materials and defective materials. For some materials, we don’t even know what they are. Therefore, the customers are allowed to examine the materials in person before placing an order.

“Such materials are indeed cheap. But they cannot be returned once they’re purchased. So, let’s get one thing straight. The Bountiful Treasures Pavilion does not endorse any of the materials. Chances are that one might spend a few million on what one thought to be precious, only to find out that it is a bizarre stone in the end. The Bountiful Treasures Pavilion will not take any responsibility in such cases.”

Mr. Lin paused and said, “This is not a rule invented by the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion, but a common practice of all the material exchange centers in and beyond Serpent City.”

Mr. Lin smiled and continued, “It is indeed risky to buy unknown materials and defective materials. But the yield can be amazing too, if you’ve picked the right stuff. Somebody became a magnate overnight, yet somebody was so addicted to the activity that they paid a few billion for loads of garbage. It is interesting that many Cultivators call buying unknown materials and defective materials ‘treasure gambling’, which is even more attractive to them than purchasing ordinary materials.

“It just so happens—”

Mr. Lin took out an emerald card made of green jade from his pocket and said, “If Mr. Fang wishes to buy unknown materials and defective materials, I can take you to the warehouse right now. However, a new batch of materials will be delivered tomorrow, which is said to contain several unknown materials from other worlds. Many Cultivators have expressed their interest. Therefore, the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion is going to hold a large trade fair for unknown materials and defective materials in two days’ time. Since Mr. Fang apparently is an expert of the business, I assume you are interested too. This is a VIP invitation card for you. Please keep it. If you’re not occupied in two days, feel free to drop by.”

Li Yao was instantly attracted. Unknown materials from other worlds?

It was going to be an eye-opener!

There were other affairs that he needed to attend to in the Serpent City, which would cost him another two days anyway. Therefore, he accepted the card and replied without hesitation, “Sure. I’ll be at the trade fair in two days.”

After thinking for a moment, he asked, “Mr. Lin, I’m looking for a powerful Cryptohacker. Do you have any idea whom I can turn to?”

Mr. Lin answered, “There are several skilled, experienced Cryptohackers within the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion. Please wait a moment, Mr. Fang.”

He typed fast on the keyboard for a while and exclaimed in joy, “Master Qin is free at present. I’ve made an appointment. I’ll show you the way, Mr. Fang.”

…

Master Qin was an obese, bald, middle-aged man who probably weighed more than 150 kilograms.
His office was brimming with crystal processor components. Crystal wires were everywhere, like a thickly dotted spider net.

Dozens of mini crystal processors were flying among the crystal wires, humming like the busy bees in flowers.

“Impressive!”

Li Yao was also a crystal processor fan. He immediately recognized that this Master Qin had assembled a super crystal processor of insane computation ability by dismantling seven different kinds of mainframe crystal processors and modifying them.

The room was the shell of the crystal processor. They were standing inside it right now.

Of course, Li Yao was smart enough not to give him the Cosmos Ring directly.

He had parsed the double encryption in the Cosmos Ring and input it into a mini crystal processor.

As long as the Cryptohacker showed him how to resolve it, he would be able to take care of the rest of the stuff.

Li Yao handed over the mini crystal processor

Master Qin did not pay much attention to it at the beginning. He kept cramming dry fruits and cakes in front of him into his mouth, while a few crystal wires connected the mini crystal processor to the super crystal processer automatically.

“Shua!”

Four light beams appeared in front him. Rows of data poured down like a green storm.

Half a minute later, Master Qin stopped eating snacks. Greasy sweat was flowing down his forehead.

A minute later, Master Qin sat up straight. Eight light beams were blinking in front of him. His thick and short fingers were crushing the virtual keyboard.

Two minutes later, Master Qin’s eyes were beaming in crimson. Oinking noises were coming from his throat, showing that he was taking it more seriously than ever. There were more than fifty crystal wires connected to the mini crystal processor, and twelve light beams were floating in front of Master Qin.

Five minutes later, Master Qin stopped all actions. His facial muscles were wrinkled together as he was thinking hard.

Ten minutes later, after a long sigh, Master Qin collapsed like a rice bag that had just been emptied.

“This double encryption is very weird and does not seem to come from one person. Rather, there seem to be a gap of hundreds of years between the two encryptions.

“Also, the two encryptions are both in odd styles. The first one is eccentric, the second one ruthless and aggressive. If I crack it by brute force, chances are that my crystal processor will be set off!”

Chapter 269: Invisible Bug

Pondering for a moment, Master Qin shook his head and said, “The second encryption is obviously consistent with the style of ancient encryptions from the Star Ocean Imperium, of which I’m no expert. If I’m given another month, I might be able to create a new algorithm to bypass it. But the chances of success are not very promising. 30% tops, I estimate.”

Li Yao frowned. He didn’t expect the encryption in the Cosmos Ring to be so complicated.

But it was reasonable on second thought. If the encryption was simple, the snake demon would’ve cracked it already, and he wouldn’t be the one taking the advantage now.

Li Yao said, “I could give you one month. But the 30% success rate is too low for me. Thank you for your effort, Master Qin.”

While he was talking, he took back the mini crystal processor.

Master Qin sent the mini crystal processor into his chest by manipulating the crystal wires. He thought for a moment and said, “Ancient encryptions of the Star Ocean Imperium are a very special research field. Not many Cryptohackers in the Serpent City are familiar with it. Let me see… You can try and see if Yuan Qi, the ‘Invisible Bug’, could do something about it. He’s a wizard of the field.”

“Invisible Bug?”

Li Yao squinted. He started to wonder what this nickname stood for.

…

An hour later, Li Yao marched to the underground of Serpent City and stepped onto a giant lift.

Every major city of the federation had an underground ghost city. Serpent City was no exception.

Or rather, the underground world ten times larger than the one on the ground was the main body of Serpent City.

Li Yao recalled what Master Qin told him.

Yuan Qi, the Invisible Bug, didn’t belong to any organization. He was an unaffiliated cultivator.

As a research-type Cultivator as well as a genius Cryptohacker, he had cracked countless encryptions and broken into the mainframe crystal processors of many major sects. He was like a small, shapeless bug that no barrier could stop.

He had been wanted by the federal government due to the illegal intrusions. Later, he somehow made a deal with the federal government, or maybe the federal government valued his talent too much. Whatever the reason was, his name disappeared from the wanted list, and he moved to Serpent City; he had caused no more trouble ever since then.

Or rather, he stopped causing trouble under the name ‘Invisible Bug’.

Even if he caused trouble, no one could relate him to the name ‘Invisible Bug’ anymore.

He was exactly the kind of person Li Yao was looking for.

“BAM!”

The lift stopped at the minus 37th level underground Serpent City.

The moment Li Yao walked out, a familiar scent of rust and hot waves hit his face.

What came next was the sound of booming vehicles, hoarse shouting of the crowds, and screaming of the overloaded power rune arrays.

Even the air was burning.

In front of Li Yao was dozens of giant, dilapidated metal buildings which looked like bird nests made of steel.

Among the gaps of the bird nests were tangled race tracks that weaved high and low.

Almost a hundred shuttles were rushing on the race tracks, none of which were willing to slow down a little bit.

There were also many auditoriums inside the bird nests, in which many spectators were cheering in excitement. When a shuttle passed by them at a close distance, there would always be a round of crazy screams.

The dome of the underground city displayed a lot of light beams, each standing for a different world fragment.

The conditions of the world fragments were extremely bad. Some were raining hard; some had volcano eruptions; some were deprived of gravity and rugged stones were flying in the air.

Countless shuttles were rushing like lightning in the world fragments.

This level was the ‘Super Shuttles Racing Arena’ in the underground of the Serpent City.

Super shuttle was a special kind of shuttle.

Armed shuttles such as the Mystic Bird Battle Shuttle and the Crimson Flame Battle Shuttle, despite their remarkable price, focused more on combat ability. Therefore, they often carried a lot of attack magical equipment. Their shape designs had taken battle needs into consideration too. All in all, their speed was not the fastest.

The super shuttle was a kind of shuttle refined with speed as the priority.

All unnecessary components were removed to minimize the weight. Comfortability, attack ability, and defense ability were all put aside, just in order to improve the shuttle’s top speed.

Shuttle racing was a popular sport in the Cultivation world.

When they boomed into supersonic speed, even the Cultivators could feel their heart beating fast and their blood swelling.

Therefore, many Cultivators loved shuttle racing very much. Yuan Qi, the Invisible Bug, was one of them. He was passionate about the sport, if not addicted.

Standing outside of one of shuttle racing arenas, Li Yao was in a trance.

Memories from nowhere flooded in and drowned him like rising tides.

The strange dream that had been haunting him since he was a little kid, in which Li Yao, an earthling, was the best racing automobile mechanic and the most skilled underground racing driver in his city, crept back.

Li Yao had buried the dream deep into his brain. He barely touched anything related to shuttle racing in his entire life.

Over the past a year and a half, after he’d absorbed Ou Yezi’s memories, it was the Hundred Smelting Clan 40,000 years ago that often showed up in his dreams. The earthling Li Yao hadn’t visited him for a long time.

He even thought that the dream was already gone.

But when he was standing outside the shuttle racing arena listening to the roaring, booming, cracking and shouting, he suddenly realized…

An intangible seal deep inside his head had been torn apart instantly, like a fierce animal that just broke out of the cage in which it had been locked for years. Irritating power flowed through his veins. His every finger and every toe started itching and jittering uncontrollably.

“Pfff…”

Li Yao exhaled a long breath.

Of all things in the world, this Invisible Bug Yuan Qi happened to like shuttle racing best!

Li Yao had planned to wait for Yuan Qi outside of the arena, but somebody seemed to have cast a spell to his legs which brought him into it.

Li Yao used a lift to reach a gap on the top of the bird nest and sat down in a random seat.

In the middle of the bird nest, a shuttle race was coming to an end.

The eight shuttles in the game had all dashed into supersonic speed. The earsplitting noises from them were transformed by rune arrays into blood-boiling roars, which brought an authentic feeling of momentum for the audiences.

“Swoosh!”

“Swoosh!”

“Swoosh!”

The race tracks in the bird nest were all three-dimensional. They were embroiled together, and there were cliffs and high walls here and there. Sometimes the shuttles on them needed to move vertically or even do a 360 degree rotation.

In the last spurt, three shuttles, due to slow reactions, crashed into the guardrail.

Fortunately, there were defense rune arrays on the race tracks and rosy gelatin for protection of drivers inside the shuttles. The drivers were all uninjured after the accident, although their shuttles were nothing but piles of garbage now.

The rest of the five shuttles continued chasing one another. A black shuttle was in the lead, followed by an orange one, which was trying to surpass the black shuttle ahead of it. But the black shuttle was suppressing the orange one the whole time. At the last turn, the orange shuttle almost hit the wall due to over-acceleration. While it was readjusting its direction and speed, two other shuttles exceeded it, making it a fourth place in the end.

“Swoosh!”

The black shuttle was the first to pass the finish line. The race was won!

A moment later, the five shuttles all arrived in the maintenance area under the bird nest.

The hatch of the orange shuttle, which had a flying, two-winged bug in it, was opened. A young man, who had dark circles under his eyes and pale skin that were indicative of an all-year-around indoor life, jumped out of the shuttle and cursed while slapping its hatch.

“Yuan Qi. You lost yet another three million to me after this game!”

A tall young man crawled out of the black shuttle which was painted with a demon pattern and laughed.

Yuan Qi’s face was flushed with shame, the veins on his neck bulging. He stomped on his feet and exclaimed, “Gao Rong, don’t overestimate yourself! I was a little bit sluggish at the last turn, otherwise I would’ve surpassed you for sure! I’m going to modify my shuttle right now. Let’s race again, I dare you!”

Gao Rong, the tall young man, smiled and replied casually, “Anytime. We can play however many games you want as long as you’ve still got the money to lose.”

The shuttle racing arena offered super shuttles for rent to visitors. But most of its profits came from the sales and modification of super shuttles.

A super shuttle was even more expensive than armed shuttles such as the Mystic Bird Battle Shuttle or the Crimson Flame Battle Shuttle by itself. The cost of upgrading and modifying them was a bottomless hole.

Fans of the super shuttles were mostly rich Cultivators. It was not unusual for two competitors, when in a quarrel, to spend millions on upgrading their shuttles on the spot.

Yuan Qi was a regular customer of this super shuttle racing arena. The moment he declared war on his opponent, many staff members dragged his super shuttle to the modification workshop. An old, grey-haired, seemingly professional man held a crystal processor and asked Yuan Qi to select an upgrade plan.

Cost of the plans were, naturally, astronomical.

Li Yao stepped forward.

“Master Yuan, Master Qin of the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion has referred me to you. I have a double encryption that, according to him, you are the only one in the entire Serpent City capable of cracking.”

Yuan Qi heard none of it. In bloody redness, his eyes were fixed on a resplendent upgrade plan as he gnashed,

“Good. Good. Good. I want this power module of the latest model as well as the sprint system. Haha. My top speed will be increased by three percent. That boy Gao Rong is dead for sure!”

Li Yao frowned. He raised his voice,

“Master Yuan?”

Yuan Qi didn’t even bother to look at him. Waving his hand, he said unconcernedly, “Wait until I beat Gao Rong in the next game!”

Li Yao glanced at the upgrade plan and his eyebrows were even tighter. He didn’t want to waste his time, so he said straightforwardly, “But you’ll only be slower under this new plan. You wouldn’t defeat him even if you play another ten games with him.”

“What?”

This time, Yuan Qi finally looked up. His triangular eyes were glaring, “What did you say?”

The old man who had been promoting the upgrade plans to Yuan Qi looked at Li Yao in dissatisfaction and said, “Dear sir, the Aurora Autos is a renowned shuttle dealership that has operated for decades in the Serpent City. The quality of our goods and service has won universal praise. The upgrade plan consists of super shuttle components of the latest model. Although they are a bit costly, they’ll definitely enhance the performance of the vehicle. Based on what did you say such vilification?”

Li Yao said, “Make no mistake. I’m not saying that the upgrade plan is not good. I’m just saying that Master Yuan is… too weak!”

Chapter 270: Black Worm

Yuan Qi waved his arms and jumped about like a monkey whose bottom was being burned. Pointing at his flushed nose, he shouted, “I am too weak?”

“You are.”

There was no expression on Li Yao’s face. He explained, “Considering that you are just an amateur, you are reasonably skilled. Your linear acceleration and spinning at turns are pretty impressive. But an amateur is just an amateur. You lack a lot of basic training. When everything is fine, you’re fine; but when there are emergencies such as the three super shuttles hitting the guardrail previously, you are seriously affected.

“Also, you were not calm enough when you fall behind. You were even provoked by your opponent and made a terrible last turn, which caused you to fall from second place to fourth place in the end. Is there a problem calling you too weak?”

Yuan Qi’s swinging arms suddenly lost momentum.

He was a famous amateur racing driver in the Serpent City. The Aurora Autos, in order to attract him to spend more money, often flattered him as best as it could. He had never heard such sharp observations before.

The grey-haired old man of the Aurora Autos was also fascinated. He examined Li Yao carefully.

Yuan Qi was puzzled for a while. Then he shouted again, “You just said that the more I upgrade my super shuttle, the slower it will become. Why is that?”

Li Yao said, “You made a mistake that is common among amateurs. The faster, the better; the lighter, the better. This is a well-accepted misconception, because you never thought about whether or not you are capable of harnessing it.

“Your lack of training results in your unstable racing style. The faster and lighter your super shuttle gets, the more difficult it will be for you to drive.

“If you drove it alone, or you were always in the lead without interference, that would be fine.

“But when you are rivaling with somebody and get distracted, or when your shuttle was scraped against, you will be all hurry-scurry not knowing what to do.

“According to what I saw in your last lap, you were already hardly able to control that speed. It was lucky for you not to hit anything on the spot.

“But the upgrade plan you just chose imitates the bones of eagle-type dragon beasts, which will decrease the weight of your super shuttle by 2% and increase the speed by 3%. It’s definitely not something that you can handle.

“If you pick this plan, your shuttle will shake like a candle being blown in wind within two laps.”

The confusion on Yuan Qi’s face turned into frustration. He murmured,

“Do you mean I’m going to lose anyway?”

“Not exactly.”

Li Yao thought for a moment and said, “You’re equally skilled as the driver of the black shuttle. He is only slightly better than you.

“He made the same mistake that you did. He also paid too much attention to weight and speed and overlooked stability. He could barely control his vehicle at that speed.

“In my opinion, you should switch to a less powerful rune array system and cut down the power output by 5% to 6%.

“As for the shell, you don’t need biomimetic materials for it. Any ordinary alloy material will be good. It will be better if your shuttle is 7% to 9% heavier than it currently is.

“Right, you have a habit of leaning leftward during your acceleration. You might want to take that into consideration when you’re configuring the balance system of the vehicle. Make a minor adjustment to the stabilizer fins and you will be good to go.

“After such modification, you should be able to find the balance between speed and usability.

“Moreover, I think your opponent is not best at the vertical parts of the race tracks, especially the vertical drops. His movement was rigid during those parts. I assume he might be a victim of acrophobia.

“You can try to attack him on the vertical drop racing tracks and break his rhythm. It will be even better if you can trouble his mind.

“As to precisely what upgrade plan to choose, you might want to listen to the opinions of this gentleman here.”

Scratching his face, Yuan Qi nodded in agreement. He turned to the grey-haired old man.

Cold sweat was appearing on the man’s forehead as he knew he had met a true expert today.

Li Yao’s upgrade plan was all based on ordinary materials. There wouldn’t be much profit in it.

However, he did not dare to assert his upgrade plan. Suppose the upgrade plan he recommended was too much for Yuan Qi and the modified shuttle hit the wall in the end, the credit of the Aurora Autos would be undermined, because Li Yao had forewarned them and yet they insisted on it.

Since Yuan Qi was an old customer, Aurora Autos wouldn’t kill the goose that laid the golden eggs. Pondering for a moment, the old smiled and said sincerely, “This gentleman does have a point. It’s my fault that I failed to look at it in the big picture. I can draw a new upgrade plan according to his ideas. This way, please, Mr. Yuan.”

Yuan Qi was too hasty to stay any longer. He gestured for Li Yao to wait a moment and followed the grey-haired old man away.

However, Li Yao didn’t feel too confident about his remarks.

Victory or failure of the super shuttle racing could be determined within a single second. There were too many factors that could affect the outcome during the second. A better super shuttle couldn’t guarantee a victory in the end. It was the on-the-spot performance that mattered most.

If Yuan Qi was not in his best state and lost the game, he’d definitely blame Li Yao for his failure. It would be bad.

But one couldn’t unsay what one had already said. Li Yao could only sit down and watch other racing games while waiting patiently.

The drivers in the races were all amateurs. Li Yao lost interest in them after watching several laps.

Bored, he shut his eyes and displayed the structure design of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit in his brain. Burying himself inside the suit, Li Yao started studying.

It was not until two hours later when he was contemplating an amazing idea that he was interrupted by a wild, joyful scream.

“I won the game!”

Li Yao opened his eyes. Yuan Qi was laughing with his mouth spreading wide open in front him. He shouted, “Hey, over the two years I’ve been competing with Gao Rong, I’ve never experienced a game as exhilarating as today. I pushed him into a corner and his shuttle got overturned. My friend, you truly know what you’re talking about!”

While he was talking, Yuan Qi stretched out his hand and said, “You said you have an encryption that you want me to crack? Let me take a look at it.”

Li Yao smiled and handed over the mini crystal processor before activating the double-encryption.

“Without your enlightenment, I would’ve gone further down the path of over-modification, never to come back. There wouldn’t be a chance for me to defeat Gao Rong anymore. Lucky for me! Lucky for me!”

Yuan Qi browsed the encryption casually while he was talking nonstop, stilling dwelling in the world of super shuttles and his victory.

A moment later, he gasped and seemed to become a different person. The easiness on his face was replaced by solemnness. There were two deep lakes in his eyes. He murmured, “Beautiful! So beautiful! The double-encryption is dazzlingly beautiful!”

Yuan Qi gazed at the light beam of the crystal processor as he walked forward, forgetting the existence of Li Yao. It was not until he was at the exit of the super shuttle racing arena that he remembered that the owner of the double-encryption was beside him. He exclaimed, “Come on! Let’s go to my place.”

…

Yuan Qi lived on the minus 45th floor of Serpent City, which was full of shuttle workshops and second-hand crystal processor dealers.

“Super shuttle is my love, crystal processor is my life. I can get them both here.”

Bypassing a mountain of crystal processor waste, Yuan Qi led Li Yao to the door of a shabby warehouse.

Li Yao scanned the environment with his spiritual threads and was shocked.

Outside of the seemingly ramshackle building, there were some twenty complicated barriers that guarded its door like invisible devils.

If a burglar unaware of their existence broke into it, he would definitely be trapped or even killed by them!

Yuan Qi waved his hands. All the barriers vanished instantly, and the door of the warehouse opened slowly.

“You’re back, master!”

Two virtual figures greeted them the moment they entered the warehouse.

One of them was a beautiful, mature woman in her thirties, while the other was an alluring girl who barely reached adulthood. They were so vivid that one can see their breasts bouncing as they bowed to their master.

Coughing, Li Yao was embarrassed.

With a cunning smile, Yuan Qi boasted, “Little Left and Little Right are two telepathic thoughts written by me. Their computational ability is so strong that they might as well be called artificial souls. They’re much more useful than real-life girls, not to mention that they talk much less. I can write one for you, too, if you want. You can store it in your mini crystal processor and carry it with you wherever you go. This way, you can summon it whenever you want and do whatever you want on it. It is so much fun that I guarantee you will lose interest in ordinary girls.”

Li Yao showed no expression. He said, “Thank you, Master Yuan. I’m more interested in the double encryption at present.”

Yuan Qi’s lips curled. Pitying Li Yao’s lack of sense of romance, he tossed the mini crystal processor up above.

More than ten crystal wires dashed out of darkness and shrouded the mini crystal processor.

Some forty stereoscopic light beams fell down from the roof and formed a golden, glittering throne in which Yuan Qi sat down.

“Shua!”

A colorful, virtual keyboard full of mysterious runes that was five times larger than common keyboards was deployed in front of Yuan Qi.

Right now, Yuan Qi was like an emperor who had reassumed his crown, or a general who was going to inspect a parade of thousands of soldiers!

The weasel was gone. Standing before Li Yao right now was a strong man with an intensive scent of spiritual fluctuation around him. Countless crystal wires were dancing behind him as if they were his hair.

“Is this the true strength of the ‘invisible bug’, the super encryption hacker?”

Li Yao complimented him in his mind. The invisible bug was indeed much more impressive than Master Qin of the Bountiful Treasures Pavilion.

“Awesome, Master!”

“You are cracking yet another encryption, Master! You are so handsome when you’re cracking an encryption, Master!”

The two artificial souls were singing and dancing around Yuan Qi. Now and then they would lean down to Yuan Qi’s ear and moan in a way that was very sexually unsettling.

“…Okay, I thought too highly to him.”

Li Yao was stunned and didn’t dare to look at them.

A moment later, the crystal wires behind Yuan Qi were all stretched straight. With the flooding of spiritual energy, they seemed to have expanded in size multiple times.

In the meantime, countless figures and data streams appeared on the stereoscopic light beams which were then transformed into a weird pattern by Yuan Qi’s slow yet firm operations.

Thousands of small bubbles in red and white appeared on the light beams. Some black worms were wandering and looking for gaps in the bubbles.

Once the worms found a gap, they would penetrate into the bubble through the gap and contaminate it. The bubble then turned black and withered quickly.

“This is an encryption cracking technique of my own invention.”

There was pride in Yuan Qi’s voice. “The red-and-white bubbles you see are the encryption that has been double-parsed and double-simulated. The worms are a corrosive, contagious telepathic thought that I wrote the other day based on 37 different algorithms.

“And I have named the telepathic thought—’Black Worm’!”

Chapter 271: Long Time No See, Old Friend

While they were talking, the red-and-white bubbles were inflated again, which looked exactly the same as before, except for the black spot at the center.

“You can picture the encryption as the immune system of a human being and Black Worm as a virus.”

Yuan Qi explained, “Since the double encryption is too complicated to be broken through all at once, the worms I deployed would compromise parts of the encryption first and take in their forms so that the trigger system of the encryption would be fooled. When 90% of the encryption has been replace by the worms, it will be the time for the general offensive.”

Yuan Qi stopped and looked at Li Yao in a very strange way.

Li Yao didn’t understand what was going on. He stared back at Yuan Qi.

Half a minute later, Yuan Qi sighed and said, “The reason why I explained so much to you and even translated the arcane arts of encryption hacking into a simple and easy metaphor is because I want to tell you that this is an extremely complicated, awesome, and troublesome technique that I’ve been working on for many years, which means—

“It’s very expensive!”

Li Yao was dazed. His face was flushed.

“I’m sorry, Master Yuan. I wonder, how much will it cost to crack such a double encryption?”

Yuan Qi replied, “Usually my customers have all consulted with other encryption hackers who can’t solve their problems. That’s why they come to me. So, my charge is relatively high. Generally speaking, a hundred million for my service.”

“A hundred million?!”

Li Yao trembled in shock.

He was not used to the prices of the Cultivation world yet, which seemed to him to be in a state of apocalyptic currency inflation.

“Of course. How else do you think I can pay for my super shuttles?”

Yuan Qi rolled his eyes. Then he changed his tone and said in a smile, “However, here’s something I’m very curious about. Based on the few words you told me, I was already able to beat Gao Rong’s ass and improve my personal record by 7%.

“What will happen if you help me modify a super shuttle, one that is best fit for my own driving style?”

It was a very reasonable requirement. Li Yao thought for a moment and said, “But I can’t do anything without a workshop and modification modules.”

Yuan Qi spoke fast, “I’m an old customer of the few super shuttle workshops nearby. There won’t be a problem to borrow one room and a few mechanics to help you for a while. Their module list is very thorough, too. If they don’t have the module that you need, they can ask the dealers to ship the module to them easily. Money won’t be a problem, either. Whatever you need, just pick ’em!”

Li Yao pondered for a moment and then said, “I also need footage of you in super shuttle races from various perspectives. The more, the better. I need to analyze your driving pattern and capability.”

Yuan Qi nodded his head,

“No problem. I always save the footage of every race I’m in. They will be given to you in a moment. Is there anything else you need?”

“There is.”

Li Yao said seriously, “Show me a set of martial arts.”

Yuan Qi was dazed.

“Quadrilateral coordination is very important for drivers. I need to see how good you are.”

Deeply frowned, Yuan Qi made a funny noise. He seemed to be suddenly caught by chondropathy and performed crookedly what could almost be called ‘Thirteen Forces of War Beasts’.

“Awesome, Master!”

“Master is as handsome as ever whatever you’re doing. Little Right can’t hold myself anymore!”

The two artificial souls were singing, dancing, moaning again around him.

Yuan Qi gnashed his teeth and asked, “Now, is everything good?”

“Yes, everything is good.”

Li Yao smiled. Cracking sounds came from his fingers as he crossed his fingers and pressed them.

An intimidating aura of mastership enveloped Li Yao, the same as Yuan Qi back when he was behind the virtual keyboard.

…

Half an hour later, in a super shuttle workshop not far from the warehouse…

“Mr. Sun, this is Master Fang, an expert that I hired recently. Master Fang is going to modify the ‘ALKAID[1]’ that I sent for maintenance here the other day. He is going to need one of your rooms as well a few mechanics to help him. Is there any problem?”

Yuan Qi was very familiar with the boss of the workshop. He grinned as they spoke.

“Of course not. I’m sure that Master Fang must be a top expert of the trade. We’re grateful that we have the opportunity the learn from Master Fang. No problem at all.”

Mr. Sun showed them the way into his workshop with a big smile while he was sneering in his mind wondering how much money this so-called ‘expert’ had swindled out of Yuan Qi.

This was not the first time that Yuan Qi had introduced an ‘expert’ to him, who was entrusted by Yuan Qi to modify his super shuttles. Expert or not, the fees they charged were all shockingly high.

But of course, Mr. Sun wouldn’t say it out, because just like the ‘experts’, he was also counting on Yuan Qi’s money to feed his own family.

Anyway, Yuan Qi was a well-off encryption hacker. The expenses were nothing in his eyes.

In Mr. Sun’s eyes, the top principle of the Cultivation world was that friendliness was the harbinger of wealth. It was best to flatter one another and make money together. Why should he tell the truth and scare the big client away?

Therefore, the moment Li Yao entered his door, Mr. Sun had started adulating him.

According to the five minutes of speech that he gave, Li Yao had become the best super shuttle modifier in the entire Star Glory Federation.

“The ‘ALKAID’ is all yours now. She is my most beloved super shuttle. I’ve had to keep her here for maintenance because of a minor accident the other day. That’s why I had to use a substitute for the race today.”

Yuan Qi smiled, “It’s quite time-consuming to crack a double encryption. I expect that there will be another day and night before it is done. I need to keep an eye on the process. In the meantime, I hope you can give ALKAID a new life.”

Yuan Qi left the workshop. Mr. Sun and a few mechanics came close and grinned.

“I don’t think we’ve met before, have we?”

Li Yao nodded his head. He said, “I don’t participate in super shuttle races. I’m just an amateur, modifying shuttles for fun, that’s all.”

Mr. Sun and his mechanics looked at each other in amazement. ‘Impressive! An amateur has earned Yuan Qi’s trust. He must know what he is doing.

‘Watch and learn how he does the job!’

Mr. Sun gestured to the mechanics with his eyes.

Yuan Qi was not a newbie who knew nothing about super shuttles. Yet, he was not an expert of it, either. Such snobs were the easiest to trick. But it required true knowledge to fool them too.

Mr. Sun and his lot was wondering how Li Yao was respected as ‘master’ by Yuan Qi.

Li Yao was indifferent to their reactions. He buried himself in his own world.

Pondering for a moment, he inserted the jade slips that Yuan Qi offered to the mini crystal processor.

“Shua! Shua! Shua! Shua!”

More than ten feeds of Yuan Qi’s races were opened simultaneously. He concentrated his attention on them and started studying.

Three hours later, he was still studying.

Li Yao was frozen solid. Even his eyelids seemed to have been glued. The three hundred or so video clips had been played for seven times, yet they were replayed in slow motion for another time.

One mechanic couldn’t help but ask, “Is he asleep?”

Everybody was impatient after long-time watching. Many of them were yawning. Even Mr. Sun was feeling drowsy.

An hour later, Li Yao rose up and woke Mr. Sun who was taking a nap.

“Where’s the ALKAID? I need to see the shuttle.”

Inside the garage, in the deep darkness were seven parked shuttles, including a few armed shuttles that worth tens of millions.

Yet their brightness was all eclipsed by the super shuttle in the middle that was black and red.

The super shuttle had been designed with an aggressive style. Its sharp edges brought the feeling of a black dagger in blood that was ready to pierce through the heavens and tear the stars apart.

Closing his eyes, Li Yao could picture the super shuttle storming in a beast tide crumbling everything in its way with nothing but the shocking speed.

No wonder it was named ‘ALKAID’. It seemed to be capable of slashing an entire army from head to toe without any interruption.

The hatch of the shuttle slid open. Li Yao sat inside and stretched his spiritual threads to every corner of the super shuttle. He felt that the super shuttle and him had melded into one which shared the same blood and soul.

“Lup dub! Lup dub! Lup dub! Lup dub!”

The hatch was closed. The whole world disappeared in silence. The only thing that could be heard was his own heartbeat that was faster and faster.

“Lup dub! Lup dub! Lup dub! Lup dub! Lup dub! Lup dub! Lup dub!”

How long had it been since he last felt his heart beating so fast?

The dashboard was filled with spiritual energy. By telepathic thoughts, one control rune array after another was lit up.

“BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!”

The anti-gravity rune arrays of ALKAID started working. It floated from the body of the shuttle, shivering with heavy breath, like an excited fierce beast who was ready to lunge at its prey after a life-long wait.

“Let me see how good this ALKAID is… or how good I am!”

Deep inside his brain lurked countless memories of racing games. He was born into this world with these memories, which were much more profound than Ou Yezi’s.

Car racing was almost his instinct.

Three months of crystal suit training had endowed him with a lot of driving skills—driving a crystal suit was quite similar to driving a super shuttle, if not hundreds of times more difficult.

If he could handle a crystal suit, he could certainly handle a super shuttle.

The seemingly complicated dashboard of the super shuttle was as clear as a drop-down menu in Li Yao’s eyes.

With a telepathic though, ALKAID rushed out like a laser!

…

Next day in the morning, Yuan Qi, who had been busy all night, returned to the workshop.

Although his eyes were full of blood streak, he was really excited.

However, to his confusion, Mr. Sun and his mechanics looked awful in the workshop.

Seeing their terrified faces, one might have thought a majestic, prehistoric animal had ensconced itself in the room behind them.

[1] A star in the constellation of Ursa Major, formally known as Eta Ursae Majoris. See more details on Wikipedia.

Chapter 272: A Track Worth Over a Hundred Million

Yuan Qi’s focus was strongly attracted by some kind of strange things floating in the air just as he entered the workshop.

Under the illumination of lights, floating golden threads whose diameter did not exceed one-tenth of a hair in the air glimmered.

Occasionally, one could also see some extremely thin and almost transparent golden foil fluttering, transforming the workshop into a dream-like ocean.

“This is…”

The golden threads and the golden foils seemed to have been possessed by some demonic spirit as they danced around Yuan Qi.

Yuan Qi could not help but stretch out his hand, but the golden threads and the golden foils were too light and too soft just like a gentle breeze, just like flowing water, quietly slipping away from the gap between his fingers, leaving only a faint velvety sensation on the fingers behind.

Prior to this, Yuan Qi never knew that touching a metal could ever cause such a wonderful feeling.

And parked quietly on the modifying bridge was ALKAID…

Yuan Qi could not stop blinking as his lips parted, but he didn’t know what to say.

If Li Yao had modified the ALKAID to the point that it was completely unrecognizable, added some seventeen or eighteen wing stabilizers, some glittering propulsion kits, and even replaced all the anti-gravity array glyphs, Yuan Qi would not have been confused…

As it was what all the previous experts whom he had invited before had done.

However, the ALKAID modified by Li Yao was almost the same as before; at first glance, no could say it had been modified at all.

But subtle differences that could only be sensed but not conveyed be found with rapt concentration and calm observation.

The ALKAID became sharper and fiercer, even filled with an irresistible momentum and a sharp killing intent that could destroy the world and blast the stars under the shimmering lights.

After pondering for a while, Yuan Qi was finally able to describe his own mood.

It was like what he had seen in the past was a copied painting by a student, and what he saw today was the one that had been personally painted by the grandmaster himself. Although each and every stroke was almost the same, the final combination was completely different; one was the heaven and the other was the earth!

It was like, what he saw in the past was a demon beast that was in a cage and had a binding spell cast upon it.

And at this moment, he seemed to have come face to face with that very same demon beast on a narrow desolate mountain ridge, whereas this demon beast now could release its aura hidden deep within its bone marrow unscrupulously.

Essence! Energy! Spirit!

At this moment, the ALKAID possessed the essence, energy, and spirit; it had a soul!

“Grandmaster Fang, what exactly is this…”

Yuan Qi’s heart was in a turmoil; he kept gawking for a long while like he was intoxicated, only then did he notice Li Yao who was meditating in the darkness; Li Yao was completely still like a Buddha. Yuan Qi could not help but ask in a low voice.

When Yuan Qi said “Grandmaster Fang”, his voice was completely different from yesterday, like it had “essence, energy, and spirit”; Yuan Qi was now truly treating Li Yao as a super expert, a grandmaster level figure.

SHHH

In the darkness, Li Yao’s eyes glittered with a bright gleam as he put his finger upon his lips.

All of a sudden, not only Yuan Qi dared not utter a word, even Boss Sun and the maintenance crew dared not breathe loudly.

After having meditating for a moment, Li Yao suddenly stood up and walked up to the ALKAID in large strides.

The very first thing he did was lightly caressed the left side of ALKAID, which was followed by a cold light in between his fingers as an extremely thin white blade appeared.

This blade was only the size of a fingernail; it was forged from a tailbone fragment of the Mutant Lion Dragon. It was extremely hard yet somewhat flexible too, it also had a bit of vitality to it as well and could be one with its user. Nothing was better than this blade to finely engrave the magical equipment components.

Without the slightest bit of hesitation whatsoever, a sharp white aura frantically appeared like a lightning bolt shot out from the ends of his fingers as he scraped the ALKAID’s body at an extreme speed before a golden thread thinner than a hair was pulled out immediately.

Yuan Qi sucked in a lump of cold air.

Only now did he come to realize that the golden threads and golden foils fluttering in the air were Li Yao’s pure handiwork from polishing the ALKAID’s body.

No wonder the ALKAID didn’t seem to have changed but it suddenly possessed essence, energy, and spirit. Moreover…

After Li Yao’s scraping when just this extremely fine golden thread was pulled out, it seemed as if a painted dragon had come to life by putting in the pupils of its eyes. All of a sudden, the ALKAID had come to life, turning into a ferocious beast that opened its bloody mouth as it pounced towards Yuan Qi fiercely.

AHHHH

Yuan Qi could not help but take a half-step back.

However, when he focused his eyes, only then did he discovered that the ALKAID was staying honestly where it was. But an anxious aura was emanating from it.

Giving the impression that it was an anxious, wild horse that desired to storm and break the enemy positions on a battlefield; waiting for him to conquer and ride it.

With a snap of Li Yao’s fingers, the lightning transformed into a white bone blade, and with another snap, the bone blade disappeared.

Lightly blowing on the ALKAID and half squinting his eyes, Li Yao perceived every slight change in the air flowing over the surface of the shuttle.

Li Yao contentedly nodded after ten seconds before he spoke, “Is there some problem with your heart?”

“Ah?” Yuan Qi was caught by surprise for a moment before he replied, shaking his head, “No.”

“Then go, fly it!” said Li Yao, patting Yuan Qi’s shoulder with a grin.

…

Aurora Autos was in an uproar!

This deafening and blood-seething morning was destined to belong to Yuan Qi and ALKAID!

In Serpent City’s amateur super shuttle racing community, Yuan Qi was also considered as a first-class expert. He also had a group of friends who were similarly enthusiastic about super shuttle racing like him.

After Yuan Qi got his brand-new ALKAID, he couldn’t hold himself and called all his rider friends at night to the Aurora Autos. After which—–

They were slaughtered, butchered, massacred one after another!

“What in the bloody strengthening agent did Yuan Qi eat that he became so fierce overnight!?”

“That’s insane, Gao Yan was once again forced to hit the wall!”

“Wow, he actually completed the lap in 3’49”31. He has broken his own best record by 12 seconds, 12 freaking seconds!”

One after another, the first-class experts of the amateur super shuttle racing community fell completely like dominos facing Yuan Qi who was so brave that it seemed he was possessed by some god or devil before they could even scream.

A contest between amateurs was greatly affected by the state of one’s mind. As Yuan Qi became more and more excited, he became more relaxed; his body seemed to have turned into drops of water as they completely fused with the ALKAID. He displayed difficult maneuvers that he thought were impossible generally so easily like passing clouds and flowing water, garnering everyone’s exclamations again and again.

“Impossible, he performed four sidewinder rolls in one deep breath!”

“My god, he actually accelerated doing a nose dive and only pulled up when he was just three meters away from the ground. For this maneuver, there is a very strict requirement for both driver and the super shuttle. This maneuver can only be performed by a professional player!”

Everyone, including the Aurora Autos’ staff, was scared to the point where their scalp tingled watching the insane performance of Yuan Qi.

Such an abnormal performance could not be explained by just having in a wonderful state of mind. Finally, many recalled Yuan Qi say that his ALKAID had been modified by a super expert.

At the beginning, no one paid heed to it.

Although they noticed that the ALKAID was somewhat different than the normal with their amateur level insight, they still could not say where it was different. It was just a normal super shuttle that was simply a bit ‘shabby’ compared to the modified super shuttles they rode that had been undergone all kinds of modification, to the point where they were completely unrecognizable.

Only now, when this shabby ALKAID had completely routed their strengthened super shuttles, did they recalled that Yuan Qi had mentioned “Grandmaster Fang” a while ago.

“Did Yuan Qi really become lucky and meet a master super shuttle modifier?”

While the numerous super shuttle fans were greatly puzzled in the Aurora Autos, Li Yao sat quietly in the metal bird nest.

Half-squinting his eyes, he listened to the deafening roars like he was listening to the music as he pondered about the future plans.

Modifying super shuttles was just a hobby.

His main focus was still crafting the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit, as well as building the fiend star refining workshop.

Of course, he still had to do some “in-depth investigation” on the problem of the demon beast detector with the Zephyr Guild’s Shark Qiu Guanyu before everything.

All this required a generous start-up capital support.

Looking closely at the value of heaven and earth treasures as well as the decrypting cost of Yuan Qi, Li Yao was deeply aware of how much money cultivation burned.

No wonder a vast majority of the cultivators were stuck in the Refinement Stage for their entire lifetimes. Indeed, they earned more, but their spending was also quite a lot!

“Is there a way to earn a lot quickly?” Li Yao lightly scratched his chin as he started pondering.

If he wanted to get rich, he needed to take the risk. The fastest way to make money in the Serpent City was gambling for sure.

There was a total of seven super-large casinos in the Serpent City, especially dedicated to the cultivators. Tens of billions moved up and down in minutes and seconds!

However, Li Yao knew his limitations.

Although he had sinister insight and his hands were extremely fast due to training them with the “Thousand Fingers Supple Bone Exercise” derived from ancient stealing technique day and night which could naturally be employed in gambling…

However, at the end of the day, he was just an insignificant Refinement Stage cultivator.

The big casinos in Serpent City were overseen by Building Foundation Stage cultivators or even Core Formation Stage powerhouses. A half-baked gambler like him gambled, he would only be seeking death quicker.

“What if I help Yuan Qi’s friends modified their super shuttles and earn a bit of money?”

Just as this notion flashed his mind, it was summarily rejected.

He knew very well that the cost of modifying the super shuttles and the cost of decrypting of Yuan Qi was actually incomparable.

It was only because Yuan Qi was crazy about shuttles that he put forward such conditions.

In the market, modifying an amateur level super shuttle was, at most, a few million or so.

Furthermore, modifying a shuttle was extremely taxing.

Last night, he did not make any major modifications to the internal structure of the ALKAID and mainly did some optimization to the body, and yet he was feeling faintly drawn.

It was seriously exhausting; he could do no more than a few modifications in a week.

It was a really slow way of making money.

He did not have a lot of time to waste in Serpent City. Everything needed to be finished in three days.

While Li Yao was having a headache, Yuan Qi, like a monkey mounting the clouds and riding the mists, came over shaking his arms.

Followed his footsteps were many people who were staring at Li Yao with a hungry look in their eyes.

“Satisfied?”

Li Yao stood up.

“Grandmaster Fang, wait! Help me once more, I need to challenge the Hell Storm Racetrack!” shouted Yuan Qi, which made everyone suck a cold lump of air as a look of astonishment as well as excitement appeared on their faces.

Li Yao could guess that the Hell Storm Racetrack was certainly extraordinary from their expressions. His eyebrows twitched as he looked at Yuan Qi with a look of uncertainty in his eyes.

Having won battle after battle, Yuan Qi’s confidence had shot through the roof. He could not help but rub his hands as he spoke, “Hell Storm Racetrack is the most difficult, the most dangerous, and the most unpredictable track of the Aurora Autos. Nine out of ten racers cannot even finish the lap. And now the best record for completing the lap is 11’47”35!

“Furthermore, the Aurora Autos has also offered a reward to attract more experts!”

“The Aurora Autos will pay a million as long as one can beat the best time for every 0.1 seconds!

“Ten million for one second!

“A hundred million for ten seconds!”

Chapter 273: Sweeping Stones

The Hell Storm Racetrack was a legendary racing track for amateur super shuttle racers. It was of some renown among the professional super shuttle drivers, too.

The racing track was set in a world fragment named “Hell Storm Domain”, which was a world of billowing winds full of furious spiritual energy.

The gravity in the Hell Storm Domain was only two thirds of that in the Heaven’s Origin Sector. Many giant stones were floating up in the sky and formed unpredictable floating stone belts.

A super shuttle that was running in the Hell Storm Domain would need to worry about both the ferocious wind that was everywhere and the floating stone belt that might come from nowhere.

Once consumed by the floating stone belt, the super shuttle would be like a rat that fell into a meat mincer, ready to be ruined at any moment.

The reason why the Aurora Autos offered such a high bonus was partly because it wanted to attract more super shuttle fans, and partly because it was a good way of marketing.

Every driver that had finished the Hell Storm Racetrack, whatever their result was, would need to overhaul their super shuttles or even entirely renew them.

The repair and modification fees alone were profitable enough for the Aurora Autos.

In some cases, a pissed-off driver would directly buy a brand new super shuttle from the Aurora Autos when his old one was crashed in the Hell Storm Racetrack, only to crash it again on the racetrack half a day later.

With the expenses of the drivers, the bonus could be earned back easily.

0.1 second for one million, 1 second for ten million, 10 seconds for a hundred million.

It sounded like a shockingly high bonus.

However, anyone who had touched super shuttle racing would know that when the record had reached its limitation, it would be extremely difficult to be improved by even a 0.1 second.

When the Hell Storm Racetrack was just built, the record was being broken all the time and when it happened, it would be brought down by half a second or an entire second.

But as more and more people were drawn to the Hell Storm Racetrack, many professional drivers joined the competition, too. The more times the record was broken, the trickier it was to break it again in the future.

The latest record of Hell Storm Racetrack, 11’47”35, was created by a professional driver and had stay unbroken for three months.

Even so, countless super shuttle fans were still passionate about the Hell Storm Racetrack. One of their major motivations was that there were a lot of uncertainties on this racing track.

On a normal racetrack, the gap between amateur drivers and professional drivers was transparent. There was absolutely no way that an amateur driver could break a record set by a professional driver.

In comparison, the Hell Storm Racetrack reduced the gap between professionals and amateurs to the minimum.

Theoretically speaking, if an amateur driver was lucky enough to race under a peaceful weather without being hindered by the floating stone belt, there would be a good chance that he might beat the record of a professional.

Although it was just a theoretical possibility, it was still better than nothing.

As time went by, it was not the bonus that the super shuttle fans were chasing after. They were too rich to take the small change seriously.

“I’ve beaten the professional driver blablabla on the Hell Storm Racetrack!”

Such winning declarations were what they were going after.

Therefore, although it was an extremely difficult racetrack, the challengers still came and had a go, which exactly fitted the purpose of the boss of the Aurora Autos.

“I don’t care about the bonus!”

Yuan Qi’s eyes were beaming in redness. He shouted fiercely, “I just want to know what my limit is!”

Li Yao stared at the bird nest. A moment later, he asked, “Is there any requirement for the driver or the vehicle to challenge the Hell Storm Racetrack?”

Yuan Qi shook his head.

“Nothing special. There’re just two.

“Firstly, the driver can only use the strength of the Refinement Stage. Using the strength of the Building Foundation Stage or above is strictly forbidden. It’s for the fairness of the game, which was supposed to be a pure competition of driving skills.

“Secondly, the super shuttle can be modified any way the driver deems fit, except that the spiritual shield of the vehicle must be kept below a given amount and that no aggressive weapons should be installed to the vehicle. Otherwise, someone might decide to blow the floating stone belt into pieces before moving on, which would be a foul play.”

Li Yao pondered for a moment. He said, “Let’s go and maintain your ALKAID first. I’m very interested in this Hell Storm Racetrack, too!”

…

An hour later.

Through a large-scale teleportation array, Yuan Qi drove ALKAID to the Hell Storm Domain.

Almost a hundred crystal cameras captured what was happening inside the Hell Storm Domain and sent the pictures to a giant light beam outside of the bird nest.

Some of the pictures were taken from the perspective of Yuan Qi, which made the audience feel that they were also in the super shuttle ready for the challenge.

With the booming of power rune arrays and the explosive music, everyone felt that their hearts were beating fast and their blood was boiling.

Encouraged by the passionate vibe, many of the spectators were preparing to take their chance on the Hell Storm Racetrack when Yuan Qi was done.

Li Yao couldn’t help but laughed when he saw the picture of the Hell Storm Domain.

Howling winds, drifting sand, stirring earth… The environment of the Hell Storm Domain was almost exactly the same as the Dust Storm Area where he had been training day and night back when he was in the Thunder Training Camp.

The only difference was that the intensity of the wind in the Hell Storm Domain was much weaker than in the Dust Storm Area. If it were exactly the same as the Dust Storm Area, no driver would be able to drive a super shuttle through.

Moreover, because of the low gravity, the floating stone belts that was wandering in the sky were much denser than those in the Dust Storm Area. They were like giant beasts made up of rocks lurking in the driver’s way waiting for their prey.

The scenery of the Hell Storm Domain reminded Li Yao of the days when he slayed the tornadoes one after another. His fingers danced up and down without him knowing.

The racetrack in the Hell Storm Domain was marked out by two mystic lights and extended deep into the wind and sand.

ALKAID roared and thrusted into the sandstorm, like a mighty warrior who was charging at the formation of a hostile army alone.

Li Yao focused all his attention on Yuan Qi, not missing even a minor movement he made during the race.

Having challenged the Hell Storm Racetrack multiple times, Yuan Qi was quite familiar with the raging wind. ALKAID was like a sharp scalpel, finding the gaps between winds and cutting into them in sweeping curves.

His performance, although unprofessional in Li Yao’s eyes, was good enough to drive the super shuttle fans crazy.

Everybody was pulling out their hair and couldn’t believe their eyes.

“Amazing, Yuan Qi is truly amazing today!”

“He hasn’t been interfered by the wind for an entire minute. Every gap between the gusts of wind has been detected. His movement has been precise, too.”

Li Yao smiled. It was true that getting through the wind through the gaps could avoid the interference of the wind. However, it also meant that the super shuttle wouldn’t be able to be stimulated by the power of the wind. It was acceptable, but only acceptable.

As the saying went, ‘Let the wind guide the ship when you’re sailing’, only with the boost of the wind could one expect to break the limit of all limitations.

This was Li Yao had learnt that in the Dust Storm Area.

Very soon, Yuan Qi encountered the first floating stone belt.

Countless scattered stones, under the savage wind, was colliding and crushing each other, dashing in various directions without any pattern. It was like a remorseless battlefield.

Yuan Qi slowed down, yet his vehicle was more blurred than before, like a candle which was being attacked by wind yet managed to keep burning, however unstably.

“Swoosh!”

Yuan Qi rushed out of the first floating stone belt. He accelerated again.

Soon, his super shuttle had passed four floating stone belts without being damaged.

But he was caught by an extraordinary floating stone belt when he was arriving at the finish line.

ALKAID’s shell crackled as the scattered stone hit it like bullets, resulting to countless scrapes and rupture.

“Crap! Yuan Qi has been tangled up!”

“No shuttle could survive such intensive impacts!”

“He’s going to have to quit the game!”

In everybody’s shocking scream, Yuan Qi persisted like a butterfly in a thunderstorm. With a dive, he accelerated and broke out of the floating stone belt from its below in a long arc, before he finally reached the finish line.

…

“Nice!”

Yuan Qi exclaimed in great joy, although his legs were still shivering when he crawled out of ALKAID which was no better than a pile of garbage with the deep wounds.

“12’12”38. A half-minute improvement of my personal record!

“Had I not unluckily met the damn floating stone belt towards the end, I might’ve been able to break the professional lap record!

“Master Fang, is there any possibility to further enhance the performance of ALKAID? Can you specially adapt it to the Hell Storm Racetrack?”

Yuan Qi was screaming and shouting due to over-excitement.

Li Yao glanced at him and said seriously,

“Of course it can be further strengthened. And yes, I can make it a model specially for the Hell Storm Racetrack. The problem is, will you be able to drive it?”

“Huh?”

Yuan Qi was dazed. He was just asking the questions out of thrill and didn’t expect an affirmative answer.

According to him, ALKAID was already perfect. To further boost its performance, the only way would be to replace the entire impetus system.

But on the Hell Storm Racetrack, a strong impetus system could not help very much because of the various of barriers.

Yuan Qi couldn’t help but asked,

“What does a special model for the Hell Storm Racetrack look like? And does it demand unique driving skills?”

Li Yao smiled and said, “How about this, let’s make another deal.

“ALKAID has been ravaged now and requires major maintenance anyway. I can help you repair it and upgrade it from inside to outside into a special model for the Hell Storm Racetrack for free.

“As my reward, I get to drive your ALKAID on the Hell Storm Racetrack once tomorrow.”

…

At night, in Mr. Sun’s super shuttle workshop.

“Swoosh!”

“Swoosh!”

“BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!”

The dull noises had lasted for an entire day.

Li Yao had been watching the video clips of experts racing in the Hell Storm Domain on more than twenty light beams simultaneously.

He paid special attention to the few professional drivers who had broken the records. Their video clips were scrutinized second by second with no detail being ignored.

“A professional is indeed a professional. So impressive!”

Li Yao rubbed his sore eyes and sighed.

On a racetrack that was full of uncertainties, such as the one in the Hell Storm Domain, the results of professionals might be only ten to twenty seconds better than those of amateurs.

However, in Li Yao’s eyes, the ten to twenty seconds meant that every cut-in, every acceleration, and every back-end whip of the professional players was much better than those of amateurs.

In the flying sand and rolling pebbles, every perfect movement could only bring an advantage of 0.1 second. It was a lot of 0.1 seconds accumulated together that caused the final gap of ten to twenty seconds.

Yuan Qi said that he might have been able to break the professional record with better luck.

But in Li Yao’s opinion, he had been unbelievably lucky today.

“I thought too little of the professionals before. Amateurs such as Yuan Qi are far from the best of the super shuttle racing players.

“I never thought that the professional drivers could be so strong!

“Their super shuttles are all masterpieces of experienced refiners that have been specially adjusted for the sandy environment.

“In the best-case scenario, I will only be faster than them by one or two seconds. It’s still too close.

“What should I do?”

Li Yao gazed at the light beams, as if he were a Buddha statue made of mud, paying no attention to Mr. Sun and his mechanics’ whispers.

When a super shuttle was crashed by scattered stones and falling to the ground in the picture, Li Yao felt he was onto something.

Deep inside his brain, although still not clear, a crazy modification plan and a set of out-of-mind racing strategies that had never been used before popped up.

Chapter 274: Solar Eclipse

Another sleepless night had passed, yet Li Yao didn’t feel the least tired.

He felt that there was a tornado of thunder and lightning blowing inside his brain. Every one of his brain cells was screaming in the wind!

With the coming of dawn, the illumination rune arrays on the wall and the dome of the underground world were gradually lit up, unleashing a brilliance as blazing as the sun.

Li Yao drove the ALKAID that had been given a rebirth one lap after another on an empty track. After every lap he drove, he felt that his soul was burning brighter than the previous one. Fervor and passion seemed to have become thousands of ants that were tearing his body apart setting off on the journey to infinity.

At ten o’clock in the morning, Li Yao was bursting with eagerness and ready for the match.

Together with Yuan Qi and Mr. Sun, he had the ALKAID transported to Aurora Autos by a special super shuttle truck.

However, he was truly shocked by the lively crowds outside the Aurora Autos.

The steel bird nest was glittering invitingly with lanterns and lights. Almost a hundred giant light beams were floating in the sky playing the fantastic scenes of super shuttle racing games. There were even several stereoscopic light beams which caused rounds of exclamations when they covered the crowds as if many super shuttles were diving down from the sky and hitting the crowds.

The super shuttle fans that came to the Aurora Autos today were tens of times more than those of the previous day.

There was anticipation in everyone’s face.

Several commentators were shouting desperately and firing up the audience, adding to the jollification of the scene.

“They’re here! They’re here!”

Many enthusiastic super shuttle fans moved at Li Yao and his companions while their eyes were beaming in joy.

Li Yao looked at Yuan Qi in dissatisfaction.

Although he was not crazy about keeping a low profile and did not object to showing off every once in a while, he did not intend to attract much unnecessary attention right now, considering that he was on a secret trip in Serpent City under a pseudonym after all. All he wanted was to earn some money and leave quietly.

He thought to himself, ‘What is wrong with this guy Yuan Qi? Does he have to invite so many people to watch my game and make such a fuss?’

Li Yao frowned and said unhappily, “To be honest, isn’t it—”

“They’re here! The master’s here!”

Screaming and shouting, the crowds flooded to Li Yao. Yet they ignored Li Yao as if he didn’t even exist and went on running to his back.

Not very far away behind Li Yao, two giant super shuttle trucks were landing slowly.

Two groups of people, with similarly impressive auras, walked out of the trucks as if they were two invincible armies.

“What’s the matter, Master Fang? There are so many people today. Some big shot must’ve come!”

Yuan Qi was standing on his toe in excitement trying to find someone he knew from the crowds.

“…Never mind.”

Li Yao scratched his nose and replied, not without embarrassment, “I was meaning to ask you, which big shot has come today?”

“I don’t know. I’ve been cracking your double encryption since I got home yesterday all day and night. I don’t have any time for gossip. Wait a moment. Let me see if there’s someone that can enlighten us here.”

Yuan Qi looked here and there. Suddenly he snatched a young man from the crowds, “Gao Rong, what’s going on? Is anyone special here?”

“You haven’t heard yet? Four top experts contending on the Hell Storm Racetrack. It’s definitely not something that you want to miss!”

Gao Rong was screaming in thrill, “I texted you, like, twenty times last night and I didn’t get a single reply. This is the real summit confrontation! The super shuttle drivers and fans in the entire Serpent City have gone wild with joy!”

“Four top experts? Who are they?”

Yuan Qi was excited, too. He stood up on his toes and craned up his head, trying to see who was walking up in the front.

“It’s ‘Fiend Fire’ Lu Feng and ‘Battle Axe’ Guan Dong, the two best professional super shuttle drivers and two rivals with a deep grudge for over ten years. They’re going to challenge each other again on the Hell Storm Racetrack!”

Yuan Qi gasped.

“Fiend Fire and Battle Axe are both here?”

After a protracted, messy explanation while they danced waving their hands up and down, Li Yao finally understood everything.

Fiend Fire Lu Feng and Battle Axe Guan Dong were two first-class experts among the professional super shuttle drivers.

They were classmates when they were little, and their driving talent was discovered at the same time. When they grew up, they became both friends and rivals.

Not only did they compete in the professional championships of various levels, they also liked to travel in the federation together and find interesting amateur racetracks to ride on.

The Hell Storm Racetrack was their favorite amateur racetrack.

The lap record of the Hell Storm Racetrack was set by Fiend Fire Lu Feng three months ago.

That time, Battle Axe Guan Dong was one step slower. He was beaten by 1.7 seconds.

Today, he had come for revenge.

“Wait, you just said that ‘four top experts contending on the Hell Storm Racetrack’. Who are the other two drivers besides Fiend Fire Lu Feng and Battle Axe Guan Dong, the two life-long rivals?”

Li Yao couldn’t help but asked when he heard this part.

“That’s why I said that this is not something that any super shuttle fan wants to miss.”

Gao Rong slapped his legs and exclaimed, “What we’re going to see is a dual competition. It is a match of both two best drivers and two best super shuttle modification masters. Well well well. I’m thrilled just thinking about it!”

The outcome of super shuttle racing was partly based on the driver’s driving skills and on-the-spot performance, and partly dependent on the incredible modifications by the refiners according to the different conditions of different environments.

In the world of super shuttle racing, a super shuttle modification master often enjoyed higher fame and status than a professional driver. They were respected as people who could manipulate time.

Yuan Qi asked hurriedly, “Who are the two refiners?”

“One of them is ‘Void Wing’ Mei Ze, who has been hired by Fiend Fire Lu Feng as his personal modifier.”

Gao Rong explained, “Mei Ze is one of the Novem Stellae of the Deep Sea University who specializes in super shuttle refinement and modification. It is said he was best at refining armed shuttles. Modifying super shuttles is just one of his hobbies.

“Even so, he has become one of the best super shuttle modification masters in the federation within several years.

“Fiend Fire Lu Feng’s achievements couldn’t have been accomplished without Mei Ze’s modifications.”

Li Yao felt his heart was beating fast when he heard what Gao Rong just said.

His eyes were filled with bloodthirst immediately. His hostility was so dense that it seemed be consolidating into burning waterdrops.

“Void Wing Mei Ze, one of the Novem Stellae?

“One of the best super shuttle modification masters?

“How interesting!”

“As for the last one—”

Gao Rong intentionally paused for a second before revealing the mystery.

“He is the ‘Solar Eclispe’!”

“What?”

Yuan Qi shouted at the highest pitch he could uncontrollably, “Solar Eclipse? Solar Eclipse has come?”

Right then, the crowds were also enchanting the name ‘Solar Eclipse’, which made his hysteria less shameful than it should be.

However, Li Yao was dazed for a moment.

He knew the names of most of the renowned refiners in the federation, but ‘Solar Eclipse’ did not sound familiar.

It was not until he asked curiously that he learnt the story of ‘Solar Eclipse’, who had been one of the most popular and influential celebrities in Serpent City over the past three months.

Three months ago, when he entered Serpent City by himself empty-handed, no one knew his background, nor did anyone bother to.

He then visited the most respected refiners in Serpent City and challenged them in the fields where they were most adept at.

In the first month, he hardly secured any victories.

During his worst day, he was on an eight-match losing streak. Everybody thought of him as a joke or a lunatic.

But he didn’t care. He simply challenged them time and time again, and he had been growing at an inconceivable speed.

In the second month, he was already able to draw with some refiners in competitions at their specialized fields.

In the third month, he started crushing the refiners of Serpent City one after another like a massacre.

‘Solar Eclipse’ rose to fame like a volcano eruption. He became one of the best refiners in the Serpent City after only three months.

Considering his challenging frequency, it was believed that the ‘one of’ could be dropped and he would become THE best refiner in the Serpent City within the next year.

His nickname ‘Solar Eclipse’ came from his insane declaration.

He claimed that he would become a burning star even brighter than the sun in the sky, and that when he showed up, his brilliance would be everything that could be seen. Even the sun would be overshadowed by him.

That was why he was called ‘Solar Eclipse’.

Although many people questioned his mental health, no one ever doubted his capability.

On the contrary, the name ‘Solar Eclipse’, which carried a vibe of lunacy, couldn’t be more fit for a wild, chaotic place such as Serpent City.

When his story was known, he quickly became of the idol of many young men in Serpent City.

“Wait a minute…”

Li Yao was deep in thought. “This guy ‘Solar Eclipse’, the best refiner of the Serpent City, doesn’t happen to have a bald, shining head, does he?”

“How did you know?”

Gao Rong nodded his head, “Solar Eclipse is indeed bald. But his head does not shine. When the name ‘Solar Eclipse’ spread out, he asked a spiritual tattooist to tattoo a vivid picture of annular eclipse on his forehead, which looks like a collapsar that absorbs all the lights around.”

That was the one!

Li Yao grinned. As it happened, old friends had met each other again.

“Yuan Qi, hadn’t you been wondering where Solar Eclipse comes from? It’s been revealed now!”

Gao Rong continued, “Solar Eclipse’s true name is Jiang Shaoyang. He comes from the Refining Department of the Deep Sea University and is known as the ‘Tenth Star’, the top refiner apart from the Novem Stellae. He is also the nephew of Jiang Sheng, the Supernova.”

“What?”

Yuan Qi was shocked and shook his head, “Solar Eclipse is not the kind of person willing to be below somebody. ‘The top refiner apart from the Novem Stellae’? It’s like slapping his face!”

“True that.”

Gao Rong was grimacing, “Why do you think they are holding a match today? Jiang Shaoyang, the Solar Eclipse, is declaring war on the Novem Stellae with the Hell Storm Racetrack as the battlefield. He is going to take out Mei Ze, the super shuttle modification master of the Novem Stellae, in his first battle!”

“He is?”

Yuan Qi was so elated that he felt dizzy now, “It is indeed a dual competition! Fiend Fire Lu Feng versus Battle Axe Guan Dong, Void Wing Mei Ze versus Solar Eclipse Jiang Shaoyang. How marvelous it’s going to be!”

Gao Rong and Li Yao tried to squeeze themselves through the crowd.

A moment later, he realized something. Then he walked a few steps back and said to Li Yao while scratching his hair, “Master Fang, it seems that today is not your lucky day.

“Jiang Shaoyang and Mei Ze, two experts in refining, must’ve racked their brains and modified two perfect super shuttles for this confrontation.

“Fiend Fire Lu Feng and Battle Axe Guan Dong, two ace drivers, will try their best in the upcoming game in their best state.

“Whoever wins will definitely set a whole new lap record for the Hell Storm Racetrack!

“You won’t stand a chance to compete with these guys!”