Ten minutester;


    A giant blue-colored fireball wasing toward Mark, who controlled his blizzard wings to block them. The fireball struck the icy wings and disappeared.


    The five-tailed scarlet leopard disappeared and reappeared behind Mark in an instant before opening its mouth widely.


    It was about to attack him with a Hydro st but the lightning not only intervened in perfect time but also threw a punch right at its chin.


    The scarlet leopard sted away for a dozen meters and crashed onto the group with blood trickling down its mouth.


    Meanwhile, Mark turned around while conjuring an ice spear. He looked at the leopard, which is slowly rising to its feet, "So, will you finally agree that I''m stronger than you and admit defeat?"


    Pushing away the dust from its body, the leopard replied, "I have yet to use my lethal skills, Lu Zhen. Since this is just a spar, I''m not being too serious."


    "Well, I''m also the same, Lan Ju. I wasn''t also giving my all because this isn''t a real battle and there are others around or else, it would have been finished long ago." Mark countered his statement, disying his confidence, although it appeared more like arrogance.


    The scarlet leopard stared at Mark for a few seconds in silence and then said, "Alright, if your clone managed to survive this next attack of mine, I will consider it my defeat."


    "Bring it on, then." Mark gestured it to proceed.


    The scarlet leopard then stretched its legs wide and raised five of its tails. Soon, each of its tails was covered with attribute energy.


    Within seconds, a powerful sphere was being generated above the beast. Mark saw mes, water, lightning sparks, stones, and wind manage to converge into a giant disc to be translucent in color.


    "This is my strongest attack that I have only used once in my life, Lu Zhen. The pure natural energy attribute attack is deadlier than any other attribute. Neither fire can burn it nor can ice freeze it." Lan Ju warned him as his skill reached itspletion. Strangely, for some reason, the zheng didn''t ask him to stay away to save himself from getting killed and only bragged about its mighty prowess.


    Is there some sort of n he had? There might be.


    However, Mark doesn''t seem worried in the least.


    He was quite calm as he stared at the translucent sphere. "Ke Long (Clone), get behind me."


    The lightning clone quickly got behind him as the translucent sphere wasunched. Mark used the blizzard wings as a shield once again.


    As the attack reached halfway, the zheng mumbled in confidence, "He is too proud of his wings. There''s no way he''s going to survive this. Maybe, after I resurrect him, he will get to his senses and… Huh?" Lan Ju was stunned for a second, all of a sudden, as its attack struck the blizzard wings.


    However, no destruction happened as the beast emperor expected.


    Forget about killing Mark in the process, not even a feather of his wings was damaged. The so-called pure natural energy, which is thebination of five basic attributes, got defeated in front of sturdy icy wings.


    A memory was triggered as he saw the silhouette of Lan Gengxin behind Mark, "master?"<novelnext></novelnext>


    In it, a teenage-looking Lan Ju was chatting with a dashing young man, who looked quite simr to Mark.


    The teenage boy asked his master about his strongest attack. In response, thetter replied that his wings were quite invincible.


    The scene changes to the battle against an ancient grade beast, Qilin, and its hundreds of servants. As they were rampaging all over the Kunyu mountain range, the zheng hid behind Lan Gengxin, who was blocking a powerful beam of concentrated energy from the dungeon overlord.


    "Lan Ju… Oi, Lan Ju… Hello…"


    "Ah Yes, Sorry about that." Lan Ju came back to his senses and apologized without actually meaning to do it. Mark was slightly surprised by its tone and apology but didn''tment on the matter, thinking that this beast emperor acknowledged his strength.


    Meanwhile, Lan Ju finally realized that Mark indeed has the strength to back up his arrogance. Unknowingly, his loyalty shot up by a significant amount of percentage, enough for him to ept this human as his superior.


    After removing the barrier around the ind which cut off the ce from the rest of the world so that their battle wouldn''t alert any hidden demigod, Lan Ju then cupped his fists and bowed, "ready to obey your orders, Sect Master."


    Mark felt ted by the zheng''s response but tried his best to control his emotions and spoke as he raised fingers one by one, "You have but three jobs to fulfill. One, I need you to look after the holy beasts just like you did with Anan (golden-furred kitten).


    Two, using your human identity as Wu Weibao, intimidate every idiot that tries to look down on me or go against me. And if I ask you to eliminate them, do it without asking me for the reasons.


    And three, in case of a strong enemy that cannot be handled by Baltrow, your number one priority will be protecting Song Yue. Can you do these three things?"


    Lan Ju readily agreed to the orders without questioning him, holding up the end of their earlier wager.


    "Good." Mark nodded with a smile before cing a D-Day on the Phoenix Empire''s downfall in his mind. "I look forward to that day when you will finally understand how it feels to lose everything, Lan Jingyi."


    ***


    Imperial city, Leon Empire;


    Inside a private chamber of the pce, the ruler of the biggest empire of the vermilion bird continent was staring at Shang Wei, the third prince of the Phoenix Empire as he was discussing the details of the trade and other things with the Prime Minister of the former.


    After thinking for a while, he suddenly interrupted them with an unusualment, "Prince Wei, would you like to be a key bridge between our empires?"


    "Eh?" "Huh?"


    Both of them turned to look at Emperor Shi Le in a bit of surprise and confusion. The prime minister didn''t understand the meaning behind Emperor''s words but Shang Wei felt something strange. A vague suspicion came to his mind.


    To rify his doubt, he voiced out, "How may I be of service, Your Majesty?"